Mind, body, soul

Throughout history, we observe rituals and religious practises where men torture themselves physically and psychologically. They convince themselves that they are doing these rituals such as walking on burning coals, piercing their bodies (impaling), denying themselves food, water or clothing, to please their God.

Barring murder in the name of sacrifice, all other self-inflicted torture suggests a certain yearning to discover if there is a reality beyond the physical. 'Are we matter or beyond' is the question for which answers are sought by savages through extreme means.

In Hinduism, there are stories of enlightened beings, Rishis, who sought liberation through hard penance that included going without food or water for a prolonged period of time, all the while chanting some mantra or thinking about certain God. The story is concluded by saying the God they meditated upon was pleased and appeared before them to grant them what they wished for.

Begs the question, did God come over or did the Rishi realise that there is a reality that transcends the material universe? The Rishi might as well have concluded that their dependence on anything material has more to do with mind than requirements of their body. Mind dictates to body when the spirit is dormant. An awakened spirit silences the mind by taking control of the body. 

Fundamental Rights during a Pandemic

It is an observable fact that some sections of the media is known to resort to sensationalism to sell its story. This section of the media aligns with a political ideology and fervently defends its position. It also tries to convert with the zeal of a missionary. Every story has an agenda or is part of a larger narrative. The fundamental problem with 'speaking for the people' is that you are stereotyping people and classifying them into groups like the middle class, the oppressed, the elite, the nationalists, the minorities etc. The easiest way to portray a group in good light is to compare and contrast them with another group. Sometimes a group is maligned to make a point for another group, quite unnecessarily.

Now, in the current extraordinary circumstance of a pandemic, even though the media, as a collective, has pledged its solidarity with the government in its fight against the virus, some sections of the media cannot refrain from sensationalizing and marketing their own brands by committing a mistake that could very well have been a calibrated attempt to come into the limelight for a brief period of time and then apologizing for the wrongly attributed quote. Either it is a wilfully committed mistake or sloppy reporting which makes the offense no less when you are trying to malign a leader. 

In the meantime, the wrongly attributed quote has done its damage in the court of public opinion. Now when a state government objects to such 'below the belt' tactics of an editor and uses the law to convey its objection by raising an FIR against the editor, the intelligentsia that includes judges, writers, artists and of course, the thespians come to the defense of the said individual by citing that fundamental rights are inviolable even during a pandemic.

The issue here is not fundamental rights. None of the states in our country or the central government has invoked anything resembling a social emergency. The media has every right to publish a story along with rightfully attributed quotes. Justice applies equally to the citizens, the media and the elected representatives. A leader cannot let slide a deliberate attempt to malign and tarnish, if it was so intended. It will be near impossible to determine whether the wrongly attributed quote was done on purpose or was it a genuine mistake. 

Now, to be fair, it is a violation of lock-down if anyone or any group tries to assemble for any event and if a chief minister is endorsing such blatant violations, putting the people at risk, then it is condemnable but next time, the editors must be careful in attributing quotes to leaders, lest they stir up an unnecessary and self-serving controversy. 

Deceit, Belief and the Ultimate Purpose

The self-deceit of a believer starts with seeing hand of God in everything that happens in his life. As soul is to the human body, God is to the soul. Nothing exists without God. But the role of God is that of a witness, an observer who permits the individual to act according to his own free will. When the knowledge is focused outward, the soul experiences the material world through the body (senses). When the knowledge is inward oriented, the soul realizes that there is an observer within. The construction of temples is to recreate that observer in the material world to act as a reminder.

When the soul experiences the material world through the senses, impressions are carefully indexed and stored in the individual's mind. These impressions are memories. The first impression of an individual is his attachment to his mother. The individual learns from the parents and also from one's own experiences, thus paving the way for the mind to become conditioned. It is very hard to forget once an impression is acquired by the individual.

The individual is solely responsible for his actions and its consequences. When the consequences become unbearable, it is human nature to call out for help and to expect respite or rescue by a supernatural entity that is supposed to work miracles in the material world to save the individual from the consequences. The individual often forgets that the respite is within.

The ever changing nature of one's subjective reality will ensure that nothing continues indefinitely. All experiences will pass. Even if the individual succumbs to the pressure of the consequences he is facing, he will be reborn until he voluntarily and consciously turns inwards, resist the temptations of the past impressions and desists completely from self gratification. The purpose of one's life then becomes resistance. The means for this resistance is service in the name of God, the witness. 

Sound & Fury

I visited a Hanuman temple a couple of days ago on the occasion of Sri Ram's birthday.  There was a service in progress that can be roughly translated to uttering Hanuman's thousand names to glorify and remember his deeds. The priest was chanting with a microphone in his hand. When he reached the end of the chant, the sound of temple bells drowned his voice. From there the decibel level steadily increased until it became unbearable. As if it had achieved it's purpose, the bells stopped. Then began vaathyams, thavil and nagaswaram, at its loudest. We stood our ground as if challenging the musicians to try harder to drive us away. I admit that I was the first bhaktha to flee and thus this blog was born, just outside the temple. While I was about to conclude this piece, somebody cleared their throat in a microphone and a man started rendering Ramayana in villu paatu (ancient Tamil artform for musical rendition of stories), leaving me searching for the paatu  (music) in his rather gruff voice. 

The Greatest Gift

Thinking long and hard about the purpose of life that can apply as a minimum standard for all of us regardless of our age, gender, social status, location and religious affiliations, I stumbled upon this answer. To live and die with a clear conscience – another way of looking at it is by answering a simple question – do we approve of our own actions?

I feel that if we ask this question to ourselves, we will get an unambiguous answer every time. After all this is a closed ended question. The moment we start justifying or defending our actions to ourselves, we can understand that there is a conflict – the worst kind there is – internal conflict. This wonderful thing called conscience is a true gift, a singularity we can’t escape from however much we try. We can ignore the pangs of conscience and keep doing things but this conflict will eventually make us despondent. There is incredible friction whenever we go against our conscience which tears us up from the inside over the long term. It might take years but a breakdown is unavoidable.

Every time life throws us a curveball, it is not only about how we respond but it’s vital to qualify our response beforehand. It cannot disrupt our inner harmony. We cannot sacrifice harmony for growth or comfort or even for an extension of life – who wants to lead a disharmonious life on an extended term. It is often better to silently suffer and wait for a better tomorrow than respond with action that grates our conscience. 

These thoughts are derivative at best and this blogger did not write this for any credit for original thinking. But the objective is to push every parent to have a conversation with their children about this priceless gift – conscience.

Nothing and Everything

The most over-hyped concept ever verbalized by man is ‘originality’. 

Without realizing that he is just rechristening observed phenomena in the language that is currently in use, man prides himself on his ability to ‘create’. The moment we realize that all of our actions are inspired by nature, we lose our ego and our individualized identity. This is the best that can happen to us because the moment we lose ourselves, we gain the universe. This is essentially our journey from ‘I am something’ to ‘I am everything’ or ‘everything is me’. 

Once someone experiences the relief of losing the baggage of self, he experiences a joy so profound and complete that he requires nothing further and his expectations and angst disappear. The void in us which make us fill it with nuisance such as desires, goals, ideals and ambitions, is filled. You are happy and you are content to be happy regardless of what you have or don’t have, what you go through in life or who is with you or who is not.

"The Guest" Attitude

Imagine you are on a holiday.

The place is new and you have never been here before. The people, their culture and the environment are all new. You start to have fun. You explore, you make friends and you are ever curious. Sometimes your wanderings tire you out but you don't mind. You go to sleep with a smile and sleep like a log. You wake up fresh and continue where you left off.

You learn about things, you discover amazing things. Amazing in your mind because you are curious and eager to drink it all.

Then you settle down. Stop being a guest and become a local, thinking you will grow roots here. Aim for permanence perhaps. You start planning for your future and that's a sure shot curiosity-dampener.

You stop observing because you are now living in the future, not the here and now. You take people around you for granted because you think you know them. You start to think you have seen it all and there is nothing further to see here. You want to control your experiences by plotting out a future. You develop a shell thicker than that of a tortoise and you slow down, grow old, get sick and die.

The moment before your death, you recollect your past and it feels like childhood is the best time of your life. Why? Because that's when you were most enthusiastic about everything around you. You were really interested to observe, to experience, to be in the here and now. You did not care about the future and for all intents and purposes, the past was non-existent in your mind.

What happened after childhood? Why did we stop acting like guests on holiday in a great place?