There are moments when we surprise even ourselves. As I wrote more than twenty years ago, the animal in us is beyond our ken (“The Animal in Us,” November 4, 1993). At best, we can catch a glimpse of the world as seen through its eyes. “It has been on this planet so much longer than the human species,” I argued. Billions of years, to be exact. Way too much to understand, to be sure. “The task is to access that knowledge directly, without understanding, which can be accomplished only by embracing the animal in us,” I concluded. In other words, enlightenment is the only way to grasp the world accessible to the animal in us. Timeless and seamless, it opens up only when we manage to still our minds. Forever welcoming, it is in our flesh and bones. It is in our blood. But the obstacle is no less than formidable, for the animal in us cannot make any sense of it whatsoever. Mind, what mind?