That’s all that matters! Life is too short, at least from the hindsight. A life lived is definitely too short. We don’t realize when we reach the middle-hood. Yes I know it’s not a regular word. Microsoft auto correct was quick to point that out. But with a hyphen, improvised words can be made legit. Just like in life, a little hyphen here and there makes things bearable. We worry a lot about things not being permanent. If you are prone to a philosophical bent of mind you’ll worry about the same. The basic nature of things/people is their inherent impermanence. But why are we discouraged from enjoying the little beauties of life? Just the other day, I realized how much my father cherishes talking to my kids about their school, friends and most of all putting them to bed. It’s like a daily ritual for him. Before going for his night puja he tucks them in bed and puts them to sleep in no time. Now this will not last. We will be gone in a couple of years owing to the nature of my husband’s job. So the happiness he gets out of this daily chore is most impermanent. Still the impermanence of it doesn’t make it any less beautiful.
You want a cookie, have it! The taste of the cookie will not last. You will not even want it to last. Knowing that it will not last, doesn’t make it any less delicious. Sometimes knowing and living accordingly is enough.
That’s the secret of a happy life I guess. Knowing it for what it is…transient, impermanent, short… yet nobody is stopping you from living it. And while you are living it, you might as well enjoy it.
I turned my face away I didn’t want to but I couldn’t bear to leave too I saw the brightness of the light peaking through but the strings pulling me back had a force of their own I know its transient… yes, I know how impermanent this present situation is…and the passing nature of the attraction has also registered on me. Still I cannot let go, not now for sure. I turned my face, and the light which I thought is disappearing, brightened even more Now its shining upon me, in its full glory I know that’s the way for me and I feel its there whether I take it now or later I bask in this glory, as I have never done so before this body and mind’s hold will give way once and for all.
My thoughts become ineffective if I sit on it even for a day.
I gain a new perspective as I look through the haze.
Thoughts are like food, they lose their freshness every second.
If I fail to act on them immediately, another one beckons.
Nothing is new but it all feels different.
What changes and what remains constant is the thought that plagues my mind at this very moment.
I was born, I went to school, I grew up, and I became the seeker.
I am ignorant; I think I know, I was unhappy, I am now happy. I will die. I once lived. The questions keep going deeper.
The ‘I’ that went to school is a stranger to the ‘I’ here ruminating.
But something is still the same, witnessing and deliberating.
What is that constant? The one who witnessed the ignorant ‘I’
and now is witnessing the seeking ‘I’.
This witness eludes me, yet is everything to me.
The separation of body/thoughts with the ‘I’ is completely understood. If I am not the constantly changing body and mind than what am I? I have seen the changes. What I have seen and witnessed, cannot be me. The subject cannot be an object of observation. If I am the subject then how can I be objectified?
These thoughts keep plating themselves in front of me.
They conflict, they collaborate, and they create uproar in me.
The food on my plate is appetizing to say the least
But I leave it untouched denying myself the feast.
Dreams are often compared to reality. In life, we enter when the play is on. We take time to make sense of it. Some more than others whereas some cannot figure out what is happening till the curtains fall for them. The play goes on, irrespective of who comes and leaves the stage. For you, the spirit limited in body/mind complex, it’s defined in time, space and causation. Dreams are similar for most of us mortal beings.
I came to a sleepy village, in the midst of a mountain range
Walking the unknown lanes with a blue hue,
I could see the clouds above the huts painting a grey roof.
I was denied the knowledge of who I was,
the slumber of my state was probably the root cause.
Something told me there is no outside help available to me,
Turning back looked foolish, so I decided to go on deep inside.
I entered a hut which was hosting a few souls,
I sat beside them as if that was the place I started to reach all along.
I saw my Guru (Spiritual Teacher) saying something I couldn’t hear
His smiling countenance smoothed my feathers ruffled due to fear.
A young lady sitting with me said she was Gopi,
Her presence made me feel I have finally reached my resting place,
With no desire to go any further, this ought to be my base.
We sat at the hut’s chaukhat (threshold), as the rain poured outside painting a blue and grey abstract on the canvas.
Gopi said there was no need to be gloomy, going further inside is not like walking in some scary movie.
“It’s the only thing”, she said. I heard her, along with the pitter patter of rain. The serenity and beauty of it all calmed my being so strained.
I didn’t want to go any further neither did I want to go back.
But a sudden thought of my worried family put me on the downhill track.
Gopi accompanied me as I came down the Valley’s winding paths,
She took the form of a thin dark man, but the presence was sure to last.
As I reached a stream, I saw my husband coming towards me,
I slipped out of my dream, back to the world that still has a hold on me.
I refused to open my eyes, basking in the bliss,
Holding onto Gopi, praying the feminine aura shall never cease.
I am at the lowest and the worst I am neither big nor miniscule I struggle with the basest of desires and I aim for the highest I understand the peaks And I have acquaintance with the ebbs Knowing the peak is not enough to take me high Nor seeing the ebbs taking me to the pit. I refuse to let go of the world, and the knowledge of beyond refuses to give up on me. This struggle is ceaseless, what is now known, cannot be unknown what I have seen is hard to relinquish we are at a stalemate. I beg, give your verdict on my fate.
Time travel is a fascinating subject. But is it fiction? Actually we do it every day. Our roving mind loves to go back and forth in time. How many times have we heard about mindfulness? And how many of us actually practice it successfully? We work in the present moment but think of either the future or the past. ‘Day dreaming’ is an oft-repeated word, so I’ll give you a little less cringe-worthy replacement for it…Alternate reality! Yes, we dream about what has to happen and often go back in the past to think about the events that has already happened. But do we always keep the reality intact or dive deep into an ‘Altered reality’? Imagining future is said to be foolish as it is not in our hands…but what about imagining an altered past? We often replay our past in our heads. We give it the flavor that was not in it originally. We change the chain of our conversations in some past incident to our liking. We keep playing with it in our heads. Science says time is linear, philosophy tells me past is immaterial, religion opines I have already sowed the seeds for what is to come and can’t change it. I listen to them and as I move in one direction the mind goes the other way. It understands yet indulges in the pleasure and pains of what is known and suffered all along. It reasons out with me beautifully in why I should think of a certain thought or forbid me to do something I need to do. No, it’s not lazy. It’s spoilt! Right now, in this state, we are just a bundle of memories. We act based on our experiences. What bothers me is the fact that we go for the same experiences that have become painful memories. It’s like eating a bitter fruit again and again. So either the altered past fools us into believing that the experience is going to be sweet this time or we are just doomed in this game of life and death. The answer has already been given by the experts. Our job is to put it into practice. But we suffer from Duryodhana’s inertia (The Kaurava prince who denied his cousins Pandava their rightful share of the land). When Lord Krishna went to drill in some sense into his head about doing the right thing, he is supposed to have answered something like this, “I know what is right, I just don’t feel like doing it”. Well, that sums it up for all of us. We also need to do the right thing and stay in the present. Most of our problems are created in our heads and have nothing to do with reality. It’s enough if we deal with what is actually happening rather than double our problems by thinking of what could have happened or could happen. But this monkey of a mind that we have loves to remain in a drunken state.
I have lived in ignorance for far too long. I have argued over silly things, just to get the final word. I have wrestled in the darkness of ignorance to live in denial and hypocrisy. I have denied myself the light of knowledge. I guess it happens with almost most of us. I am a part of that ‘most’. With age we do get perspective. But our ego is too big to accept faults and come out of denial that we have been living. Seeking higher knowledge helps but that doesn’t mean the end of all the troubles. It is not like one day you get up and realize that you are ‘It’. You do realize that Shakespeare was telling you the highest truth when he said “this world is a play”. Yes, indeed this world is nothing but a play and we are here to fulfill our parts to our best potential. What is real is the consciousness. It is believable but hard to live. So I know the truth but don’t know how to get over my petty existence. I still wrestle in the darkness of my desires, greed, anger and ego. I crave and suffer. I attach to certain things and people and suffer. I bow down to my ego and suffer. I let my anger take over my senses and I suffer. I let this ‘I’ get its way…way too often. And all that I end up with is suffering. I know, yet I suffer. And I suffer because I know. Would it have been easier had I not known? If ignorance is bliss…has knowing brought suffering? There is no easy answer to these ramblings in my head. But I persist with my search. I can see a glimmer of that bliss sometimes…only to fade away, too soon. If it’s real, it’s the only truth worth seeking. If it’s not there, than what good is the world?!
We experience life as it happens. But we forget to ask questions. These questions are for us to answer. Sometimes I wonder, by asking so many questions, am I underplaying life? Do I do injustice to myself by thinking too much and living a little less? Are we not supposed to wonder why, how and marvel at the irrationality of it all. I mostly understand people I come across or read about and I understand relations but I still feel disappointed and I still make the mistake of expecting. I am not saying that expectations always meet with disappointments. I am just pointing out at the futility of it all. Why do we make ourselves vulnerable? Is it our destiny as humans to be vulnerable? Bracing ourselves for heartbreaks and disappointments…using words as weapons to harm each other. At the surface of it, I guess it’s beyond our control to act rationally. So why bother, throw caution in the air! Let’s be the end of each other. I will bring you pain and someone will be the carrier of my death. We are here to nurture, protect and destroy each other. So we will do what we are designed to do and move away/on. Oh, don’t be morose! I am not saying all this as something bad, something that is not desirable. On the contrary, this feeling of hurt can do wonders to our personality. It can change us for the better. It gives us such insight and depth in relations that nothing remains incomprehensible after that. Eventually you come to a stage when you can foresee what a potential relationship holds for you. The same cycle of love, attachment, heartache, disappointment and then moving away! Once you have seen it all, why on earth would you go for it again, and again? The only sensible thing to do is to watch the movie, since the tickets have already been bought. So go through the movie, soar unattached in the vastness of its imagination and come out of it as taintless as possible.
A lot remains unsaid, it’s the society. A lot is felt, but unexpressed, in a society. Trying to define love, it ridiculed the pangs felt by Meera, now dances in joy at her divinity, is the same society.
Love has permanence, but where does the permanence lie? Does love change or just the object of its affection show a wide range? These are the questions, framed and refrained in every society. Where love solidifies, it becomes less of love more a chore for society. Love is in us, it finds expression outside…in whom, is ordained by the society. This society, residing in the mind, resisted by the heart…has found a prisoner willing to play the part.
Some have broken the bonds and attained liberation, but I am still here, respecting the confines formed by this society.
Not knowing and Knowing of the soul, there is a long road between the two poles. We walk the path having no knowledge of the destination. But to walk is in our nature, in an attempt to understand the future. Not knowing is like a pig in the mud, wallowing in dirt and enjoying the slush.
The journey starts with an increased awareness of the dirt and all things gory. Till then, it was just a mere story.
As the days progress, I weep as doubts creep in…raising the banner of revolt questioning the need of Knowing.
The state of ignorance has me in a daze…letting the pig play in the mud puts it in a hypnotic maze.
But the pig has been told that he can still play in the mud, getting dirty is an option he can surely escape.
Let the mud encompass you… The Knowing will keep your core pure as dew.
Have you ever stood in front of a deep dense forest and tried to see in the depths of it? Or ever wondered what lies inside? Is there anything that eludes our eyes? Have you been over-powered by the desire to find out that remains hidden from our view? Is there anything in the stillness that might be new?
The depths of our being is looking out and searching for what agrees to look back and say I am here, somewhere, keep trying as the search is your only rescue. I stand often in front of the infinite layers of the same deep forest, with a feeling so strong, that the depths are looking back at me without any effort. Such simple yet wondrous sites receive me every time I look there…the forest is buzzing with such unabashed bare. I also encounter some views that refuse to be captured in pretentious hues. At first glance, the eyes see only dark, but adjust your vision, the path gets lighter and brighter as you embark. The feeling of being alone gives way to a calming solitude, the need to be in the crowd dissolves in its fortitude.
I am surrounded by nature, in the lap of my creator. The union is ecstatic and swift, it’s easy to forget you even exist.
life from thought to thought 