Are giants a fiction? Ancient Greeks believed in giants—Pelops, Atlas, the Cyclops and the Titans are some of the mythic heroes, supposed to be of gigantic stature. "Greek writers, from the fifth-century B.C. historian Herodotus to the second-century A.D. travel writer Pausanias, chronicled sightings of...bizarre remains of giants," writes Joshua Korenblat (National Geographic, August 2004). Modern paleontologists have discovered bones of giant extinct mammals at the same place where the ancient Greeks reported finding the bones of heroes and giants. Most scholars are skeptical about the existence of giants and giant bones. However, Adrienne Mayor, a folklorist and historian of early science, suggests that perhaps the Greeks found the fossil bones of creatures like the southern mammoth, which then were explained as skeletal remains of giants. Could finds of such enormous fossil bones have inspired the mythic charcters? Or did the myths come first and the bones later?

Giants are not a fiction. H.P.B. cites several examples of men, in Russia, America and Europe, who were between 7 and 9.5 feet tall. She observes that Darwin's statement that species of animals, which result from cross breeding, "always betray a tendency to revert to the original type," must apply to man, also. "Had there been no giants as a rule in ancient days, there would be none now" (S.D., II, 277). She explains that traditions about the race of giants in the days of old are universal. India had her Danavas and Daityas; Ceylon had her Rakshasas, and Greece had her Titans. (S.D., II, 336)

It was the belief of entire antiquity, Pagan and Christian, that the earliest mankind was a race of giants. Certain excavations in America in mounds and in caves, have already yielded in isolated cases groups of skeletons of nine and twelve feet high. These belong to the tribes of the early Fifth Race, now degenerated to an average size of between five and six feet. But we can easily believe that the Titans and Cyclopes of old really belonged to the Fourth (Atlantean) Race, and that all the subsequent legends and allegories found in the Hindu Puranas and the Greek Hesiod and Homer, were based on the hazy reminiscences of real Titans—men of a superhuman tremendous physical power, which enabled them to defend themselves, and hold at bay the gigantic monsters of the Mesozoic and early Cenozoic times—and of actual Cyclopes—three eyed mortals. (S.D., II, 755)

H.P.B. writes: "Over and over again, the skeletons of hypothetical giants have been identified with those of elephants and mastodons....We may safely reject the modern theory that would make of the Titans mere symbols standing for cosmic forces. They were real living men, whether twenty or only twelve feet high." (S.D., II, 755)

How one does escape the curse of selfhood? Researchers have shown that excessive involvement with self can produce disastrous effects. It appears that self-reflection and self-analysis, if not done crefully, result in more harm than good. We are our worst enemy. "The inherently egocentric and egotistical manner in which the self processes information can blind people to their own shortcomings and undermine their relationships with others," writes Mark R. Leary. (Psychology Today, July-August 2004)

Research in this direction has shown that most people overestimate their positive qualities. Most think that they are less prejudiced than others, and that they understand other people better than others understand them. "Self-preoccupation interferes with memory." When we are captivated by our own thoughts, we miss out on what others are saying and are quite oblivious to our surroundings. Similarly, people often go blank while answering test questions because instead of concentrating on the test—the mind is clouded with anxious thoughts. Research confirms that people who are worrying, planning or making decisions at bedtime are unable to fall asleep easily.

Some of the remedial steps suggested to overcome undue self-indulgence are:

1. Reduce self-chatter. Learn how to quiet your mind....The techniques of meditation can minimize self-thought. As unnecessary self-chatter subsides, you will feel more calm, attentive and content.
2. Resist the urge to defend your ego. Unnecessarily defending your ego against failure and criticism drains energy and creates conflict with other people. Don't waste time or energy protecting the mental image of yourself....Turn your attention to dealing with events that have tangible outcomes.
3. Practise self-compassion. When failures, setbacks and losses occur, be gentle with yourself. If you treat yourself with kindness and respect when things go wrong, your ego will not be battered by life's circumstances and, thus, will have no need to defend itself.
4. Don't overfeed the self. It's OK to try to figure out what you want out of life and make reasonable strategic decisions towards that end....Chronically setting and pursuing goals can lead to seeing the purpose of life today as the achievement of some goal tomorrow, causing you to forget that the only life you really have is the one going on right now.
5. Don't believe everything you think. Your perceptions of yourself and the world are biased in egotistical ways. Develop a healthy sense of ego-skepticism—recognize that you do not always have an accurate view of yourself and of the world.

Most of us lead a very self-centred life that revolves around "me" and "mine." We must learn to think away from ourselves. Every now and then, the "snake of self" hisses out, drowning the voice of the divine within. So long as we are preoccupied with the little self—exaggerating its importance—calmness eludes us forever and we suffer from anxiety, depression, anger, jealousy, etc. Mr. Judge cautions against the feeling of vanity by reminding us, "Try to recollect that you are a very small affair in the world, and that the people around do not value you at all and grieve not when you are absent. Your only true greatness lies in your inner true self and it is not desirous of obtaining the applause of others." The most effective antidote to self-centredness lies in practice of self-examination and true prayer.

Every earnest student owes it to himself to examine his deeds and words, his toughts and feelings; therefore genuine concentration and meditation, conscious and cautious, upon one's lower self in the light of the inner divine man is an excellent thing. But vanity often makes its own voice pass for that of the spiritual soul; and therefore to the light of inner divine man must be added the other light—that of Divine Wisdom, of that infallible philosophy which teaches what the Paramitas or Virtues are. Self-examination is the examination of the lower and personal self by the Higher and Impersonal Self. To learn to judge our daily actions from an impersonal standpoint is to progress towards the Supreme Self....

The second practice is to attempt to raise the mind from the mundane plane of petty thoughts to heavenly heights. To cease to attend to the personal and ahankaric "I," to quiet its talk, and to free our minds in order that we may dwell on the Nature of Deity which is the Higher Self of every human being; on the Character of Those who have found what we are seeking; on the Compassion and Sacrifice of the Mahatmas and Rishis, who are the Elder Brothers and the Fathers of the human race—this is true prayer. (U.L.T. Pamphlet No. 12, Foreword)

Robert Martin, an anthropologist and curator of biological anthropology at the Field Museum in Chicago, believes that humans, as well as other mammals and birds, evolved far earlier than previously thought (Discover, July 2004). "The classical story is that all modern mammal groups started to develop no more than 65 million years ago, after the end of the Cretaceous Period, when a probable meteorite impact led to a major extinction in which all the dinosaurs died." Did humans and primates coexist with dinosaurs? Anthropologists suggest that they probably existed at the same time but not necessarily in the same areas. What about the "missing kink" between humans and apes? The commonly accepted "missing link" seems to be Australopithecus, going back some 5 million years. However, Robert Martin suggests that the divergence from the common ancestor may have occurred around 8 million years ago, considering that a lot of fossils remain yet to be found. An old skull—6 to 7 million years old—discovered by a French team, could possibly be the missing link, or the member of the lineage leading to us.

How old is humanity? Prior to physical humanity there was "boneless" and purely ethereal man. These earlier Races may have lived 300 million years ago. "The whole issue of the quarrel between the profane and the esoteric sciences depends upon the belief in, and demonstration of, the existence of an astral body within the physical, the former independent of the latter" (S.D., II, 149). Occultism teaches that the physical man existed before the first bed of the Cretaceous rocks was deposited. The Secret Doctrine describes the Secondary Age—covering Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous periods—as the age of the Reptiles, such as, gigantic Megalosauri, Ichthyosauri, Plesiosauri, etc. Unless man existed in that period, how could he describe them? The old records of China, India, Egypt and Judea mention these monsters. (S.D., II, 713)

Earth, man and all the kingdoms of nature were in the ethereal or astral stage, for a vast period of 300 million years. At the end of this period began the process of solidification. The form of man was the first to solidify, followed by solidification of some of the astral prototypes from preceding Rounds, when everything was astral. When the fossils were discovered, it was argued that those creatures must have coexisted with the gross physical body of man. "Science has not been able to find the missing links between the root-types of the astral period and the present fossils or the living species....For all of them [missing links] exist in the astral plane and therefore are invisible to the physical eye," explains Mr. Judge. (The Ocean of Theosophy, pp. 141-142)

H.P.B. argues that if the anthropoid and man had a common ancestor, how did the two groups diverge so widely from one another as regards mental capacity? (S.D., II, 189). The chasm between the mind of animal and man can be explained on the basis of esoteric teachings:

The bestiality of the primeval mindless races resulted in the production of huge man-like monsters—the offspring of human and animal parents. As time rolled on, and the still semi-astral forms consolidated into the physical, the descendants of these creatures were modified by external conditions, until the breed, dwindling in size, culminated in the lower apes of the Miocene period. With these the later Atlanteans renewed the sin of the "Mindless"—this time with full responsibility. The resultants of their crime were the species of apes now known as Anthropoid. (S.D., II, 689)

We seem to live life, carrying with us a heavy load of past baggage. We seldom appreciate situations and people as they present themselves from moment to moment. Our reactions are predominantly based on a storehouse of memory, impressions and preconceived notions. We must diferentiate between functional knowledge—that helps us deal with the objective world—and wisdom. Unfortunately, our choices are not based on evaluation of the situation itself but are tinged by past data. For instance, when a person greets us, our reaction—consciously or unconsciously—is based on the image of him stored in our memory, writes Satyendra Kaushik (The Times of India, July 23). Thus:

Should memory, based as it is on experience, have such an overriding influence on our response as to render ineffective our capacity to meet life afresh, moment to moment? Why do we persistently deny ourselves the capacity to act in the moment and then be done with it?

We should allow life to touch us in its entirety, offering it no value judgement and no fixed notions. We can try to be like a mirror, in matters of life and the relationships it offers us, capable of truly reflecting the present without any reference to the past and any expectation for the future.

We seldom live in the present. We live the life, oscillating between past and future. We begin a day, a month, a year, with hope, looking forward to pleasures and happiness. Often these hopes are frustrated. These hopes, fears and memories keep the human consciousness in a non-integrated state. We must learn to make the past event non-existent and obliterate it from our memory. The Voice of the Silence advises:

Long and weary is the way before thee, O Disciple. One single thought about the past that thou hast left behind, will drag thee down and thou will have to start the climb anew.

Kill in thyself all memory of past experiences. Look not behind or thou art lost. (p. 18)

The suggestion is, to forget the emotional experiences attached to the past events that tend to take control of our mind and colour the present and the future. Once we have extracted the lesson from an event we must let it pass without brooding over it. When we worry about the bygones, we harm ourselves. Every time we think of the harm done to us by another, we lend power to those unwholesome thoughts. Our capacity to do good in the present is adversely affected, when we dwell over the past, which drags us down from our present level of consciousness.

Memory is one of the greatest hindrances to successful meditation.

The moment the mind is restrained in concentration for the purpose of meditation, that moment the images, the impressions, the sensations of the past begin to troop through the brain and tend to instantly and constantly disturb the concentration. Hence the need for less selfishness, less personality, less dwelling on objects and desiring them—or sensation. If the mind be full of impressions, there is also a self-productive power in it which takes hold of these seeds of thought and enlivens them. Recollection is the collecting together of impressions, and so it constitutes the first and the greatest obstruction to meditation. (U.L.T. Pamphlet No. 12, Foreword)