Understanding is a process. One moves from inside perspective to outside perspecitve. That is all that understanding is. One sees the whole picture instead of part of it. One has to be outside enough to see it.

There were a few old Twilight Zone television shows with this model. A couple is inside a house where no applicance works. They get more an more upset until the big reveal comes that they are in the doll house of a giant alien girl.
In another a group of people are in a large cone, or box. They don't remember where they came from or why they are there but they keep trying to get out. I believe the big reveal was they were toys inside a toy box. Something like that, anyway.

This setup is a pretty good explanation of spiritual growth. One has limited focus and perspective. If they are very limited one may not even understand there is something to understand.  Or understanding becomes knowing from inside one's own ideas. One never steps outside so perspective doesn't really change. You could consider it like being in a globe filled with sand. Interest can come from examing each grain inside, but one is still inside. One will not know the globe exists. Stepping outside reveals one has been living by looking at pieces of sand. There's nothing wrong with that, we all do it. But there is always a larger perspective.

How does one break this circle and step outside? Actually there is a very simple method. Find things you do not agree with, and agree with them. If you have been sticking to some idea in life, really being right about it, completely take the other side. This can work best when talking to a friend and you find yourself disagreeing. Take the other side, completely, without one shred of resistance. Then move back to your own viewpoint. This can be hard to do initially. One can practice "being things'. Step outside and 'be' a particle of wind. Be a rock or a tree or a cloud. As you shift perspective all understanding becomes easier.

There is nothing in all this universe that you cannot understand, most especially yourself. Have fun!

In an earlier post I described the process of understanding as getting perspective on something. One is outside enough to see the whole picture. So what does ego have to do with this process?

Ego is the set of unconscious ideas, judgments, and opinions that you have attached to your viewpoint of something. Rather than seeing that thing for what it is, you see your own ideas about what it is.

For example, a person raised with the idea that all people of a certain race are heathens is apt to look upon any person of that race through that lens. Judgment would be clouded to some degree by that idea. The less overall perspective that person has the more he is likely to think the idea is "him". He may identify so strongly with it that merely trying to talk with him about the idea will seem to be an attack because he believes he is his own ideas.

No one is an idea, however. You are not anything that you thnk, say, do, or observe. You are you. 

Therefore any judgment or opinion that you have can be discarded without fear of loss. Every time you let go of an idea you gain perspective. You are able to step outside that idea and see it for what it is. You are newly able to judge without having that idea clouding your judgment. You can safely let go o anything at all. The process is as simple as seeing the idea, and consciously releasing it. That is all there is to it. 

YOU ARE NOT WRONG FOR HAIVING ANY IDEA! You aren't even wrong for hanging on to them. Life is not about being right and wrong, it is, if anything, about learning. Don't waste your time being wrong. That is simply more judgment and opinion. If you feel "wrong" feel free to examine and release that idea. The real truth is you are never spiritually wrong, ever. You can be inaccurate. Wlell,  join the club!

Understanding is nothing more than the process of looking somehing over to the point where you see it for what it is, from the outside. This is much easier to do as one's unseen opinions and judgments drop off.  It is completely up to you when, where, what and how you go about the process. But it's worth taking on, promise.

Have fun!

 This universe basically consists of space and "stuff" within that space. Emotions are "stuff". Their physical makeup is wavelength. They are like a radio wave or sunlight. They actually exist as something in space. You are not emotions, you "feel" emotions as you occupy the same space as that wavelength.

Our basic operation as spirit is to look into this space. It is as if you were looking into a cardboard box with the top open. You can see everything inside. Now imagine looking from a spot inside the box. You would see from inside,, looking at the walls. Now imagine being an atom sized viewpoint inside the box. The box is huge!

That is a reasonable representation of how we exist in this universe. Over much experience we have made our viewpoints smaller, more microscopic, so we could see smaller and smaller things and play games with the smaller particles. Eventually we forgot we could see big! So upon understanding this, why dont' we immediately switch our viewpoint and see the whole box?

Emotion has a part in why we don't. This wavelength of emotion surrounds much of the space inside the box. The space that it surrounds tends to be places we "forgot". Something happened and we decided not to know that space. To make this not knowing effective, we are "locked in" to a smaller reality. The viewpoints we are willing to see are contained in a small area. If we move outside that reality, we may run into emotion waves in that "new" space. These waves can be very powerful and upsetting because they are surrounding space you have forgotten. You don't know why you are getting so "emotional". Plus emotions in the United States at least, are considered "bad". Being over emotional for a guy is really bad. But for anyone emotion can be confusing and a block to understanding.

However emotion really is just wavelength that you are creating.  If you let the feeling happen and move into that new space, the emotion will eventually pass. It can be handy to have help in this process, at least early on. This might be someone who will let you experience the emotion and not try to tell you what is happening, or stop you because it is unpleasant.

What is the plus side of dealing with it? Remember this universe is largely space. The more space you can occupy, the larger your viewpoint, the better your perspective. The more emotion you deal with, the easier it gets. At some point there is no emotion as wavelength left. You see a huge space, and understand much more. To get there may take a fairly long road but you are making it much easier as you go.

Spiritual growth is not rejection of what is, it is understanding what is,. When you understand you can then consciously make the "is" you want, and stop unconsciously making emotional wavelengths that you don't want. We are at basic love. That you never lose. Have fun!

Hearts hold no question
In darkness they sway
But know their direction
Toward love brightened day

Truth is the element found in the mines
Never unravels and never unwinds
Never betrays or enforces distress
Or barks up a tree on a whimsical guess

Hard as an insight can be to deploy
Liable to misery much as to joy
When searching for love's so reclusive design
Find where one's heart lies, then truth will be thine

Mowning hay
Expulsive wind
Sunlight's recant
on distant ridge

And thee to share
recognance' bliss
This corporal earth
stirs heaven's kiss

A practice one can undertake if one chooses:

Find someone with a viewpoint that you don't agree with. Have them explain it to you so that you completely agree with that viewpoint. Completely take the other side. Then move back to your own viewpoint, You will have effectively made that other viewpoint part of your reality. You don't have to agree with it ultimately, but you will understand it. This process can be quite an eye opener. I was suprised at how much difference it made to consciously move into someone else's space.

If you get "stuck" and can't seem to solve it, try putting your attention fully on the other person. And if this seems scary or uncomfortable to you, just don't do it. At some point it can be useful, but it has to be the right time for you.

Another means to this end is "being" something. Walk outside and "be' a particle of wind. Be a rock, a tree, a flower. Actually move into that space/ This sort of shifting is a fundamental to spiritual growth. The easier that you can move around in this place, the easier life tends to be. My experience, anyway.

There is a difference, I think, between being "right" and being "accurate". 

I am always right. You are always right. The guy who sets off a bomb in the shopping center is right. The mother who drowns her kids is right. This is fundamental to this place, my opinion, and only perspective keeps us from seeing it in all things. That rightness can be determined logically or it can be felt, or both. You can "touch" God to the point where you feel that rightness. But rightness also makes sense. How can God be wrong? This is God's universe, therefore our universe. How can one piece of God be more "right" than another? Or a million or a trillion pieces? It makes no difference. You are right, all the time.

"Accurate" is another story. Accuracy by my definnition means how well one sees a viewpoint. How well one understands that viewpoint is the level of accuracy one has relative to that viewpoint. It is entirely one's own choosing to see or not see.

We are creating this place every instant, by the process of look/create. This creation is in some ratio of conscious/unconscious. If you see and understand something completely you are creating it consciously 100%. 

I doubt that anyone on earth is creating 100% consciously at present, across the board. If we were we wouldn't be here. So the relative accuracy of any viewpoint can be a useful tool to up the ratio of concsious create. 

For example, Tina is out of town and Joey "misses" her. He is unconsciously creating a feeling of loss. His viewpoint of Tina is incomplete-which is natural, she isn't there! To "fill in" he begins to create that she is seeing another guy, gets  jealous and begins to feel really unhappy without realizing he is doing it. At some point he says "whoa,, what am I thinking?" He puts his attention on Tina, creating again their relationship and his feelings for her. He realizes no matter what is going on she is a terrific person and he loves her. He consciously creates and sees more accurately. This isnt to say Tina isn't seeing another guy. But Joey is accurately seeing his feelings, his viewpoint.

You can do this operation with anything in your life. How do you know what you are creating unconsciously? Well, you are always right. Is there anything you don't feel right about? If so, you aren't seeing that viewpoint accurately. The same goes with someone else being wrong. You aren't seeing it accurately. Again you are right no matter what. But if you choose to hunt down why you don't feel right there will be something there. When you accurately see that viewpoint there will not be any wrongness attached to it, for anyone. The easiest and best way is just to look. Writing can help because it keeps one in focus. You can roll through some emotion becoming right! All those feelings of wrongness pop up. But there is a finish line and you can get there, point by point, if you choose.

There is a reason!
Let's say that you wanted to teach someone to cook an omelet. One step might be to say, okay, cook me one. If it were me I'd open the fridge and get the eggs, go to the stove, and proceed. Whether you liked the way I cooked it is beside the point. Step one for me would be to get going on it.

What if you were working with an Indian who just stepped out of a lifetime in the Amazon Rain Forest? Different story, yes? At the very least a five minute operation would be a five hour operation and might be a five day operation. So much information about appliances, electricity, utensils, the house itself, on and on and on, would need to come first. If you were very thorough it might take months before that individual could cook an omelet with the full backdrop of understanding to really know what he/she was doing.

And this is with a solid demonstrable physical model.

Now imagine you were trying to tell such a person about making an omelet with no stove, no fridge, no house, no utensils. You are sitting in the rain forest with the Indian telling him about cooking an omelet to the point where he could walk into a house and do it. How likely is that to happen?

So it is with a spiritual teacher. The fact of spiritual growth and understanding is quite "real". It happens. But most people are working from a context of spirituality completely foreign to the actual model. It is well outside most people's reality. This means for all intents and purposes that it does not exist for most. 
A fact of understanding is one must be willing to understand. A second fact is one is actually moving in space for understanding to occur. One is moving into a "new" viewpoint. This takes some doing. No one can do it for you. And since you are moving into something that does not exist for you, you don't know that it's there. You have to have faith it will be there when you get there. Otherwise, where are you? In a sense you have to be an Indian sitting in a familiar rain forest with complete understanding of your environment listening to someone tell you something completely off the wall and unreal, and then being willing to walk into a kitchen and cook an omelet!
That takes courage. Or maybe necessity. But there is a space to move into. It is there, as a matter of fact, right in front of you. Growth is a process of spaces and each one appears as you are ready to move. No one of them will open all doors. But it gets easier.
So parables are used because of the unreality that we face. There seems no sense in telling an Indian to cook an omelet. But if you tell hungry people they can eat, they might begin to create a kitchen complete will all the tools they need. And everyone who wants to can do it. Parables are a means to get the wheels of understanding turning so people can make that kitchen.