At first, we define labels and later these labels define us. The labels could be of name, status, position, wealth or simple likes and dislikes or groups/political ideologies that we subscribe to, etc. In trying to live up to the dictates of these labels, we lose track of what life actually is. In moments of natural calamities, pandemics we observe that these labels don’t mean anything – you will die irrespective of whether you are the Prime Minister or a Beggar and yet we cannot shake off the labels since we don’t know how to live any other way.
The social machinery is working on these labels and you feel that it is impossible to change the larger picture. Here is where you need to let go of trying to change the larger picture and instead focus on yourself – find out who you are without these labels and try to live out of that understanding. There is nothing wrong with the labels, it is your attachment to living life out of them that is wrong – let go of the attachment to these labels.
You are as much an inseparable part of the world as the world is an inseparable part of you. You can change the world by changing yourself and change begins by knowing oneself…
As Ramana Maharshi said, just contemplate on the question: Who am I? Reject all the labels that are imputed upon you and have the courage to go to the end of this enquiry till you find out that you are nothing and yet everything…
The difference between what “I am” what “I could be” and what “I should be” is the cause of suffering, wherein “I am” represents point A and “I Could be” Point B, “I should be” Point C and we spend a lifetime in reconciling the difference between the points and making efforts to move from Point A to the other points… This approach assumes that Point A is somehow not good/enough and that reaching point B, C,….Z is what is “missing” in our lives and we spend a lifetime searching for this missing thing.
What we fail to realize is that Life is at Point A, it always was and always will be… Points B, C, …Z are in our minds and take the attention/joy away from Point A. The essence of our being is always in the moment, you can experience it by being here and now. Irrespective of your stage/station in life if you cultivate awareness by being in the moment and observe the impermanence of everything, you will let go/not be attached to anything and experience the bliss of liberation/freedom. It is unconditional acceptance of Point A with a layer of observation/awareness.
Attention/Awareness/Being Present, my friends, is everything…
Whilst dealing with the ongoing crises, we are not only falling short of physical resources but also seriously unable to cope with the psychological effects of this ongoing trauma. PTSD- Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is suffered by soldiers who are in stressful war situations for a long time & unable to cope with it. We are collectively experiencing a Continuing Trauma Stress Disorder CTSD in the war against COVID and we don’t even know it or even if we do, we are unprepared to deal with it.
The feeling is that of being trapped civilians in a war zone who are not even a part of any army and yet being exposed to complete risks of the war. Most of us are confronting pain of the loss of loved ones, dealing with the fear of us/dear ones contracting the deadly virus & suffering the consequences. We are not only in the same boat as regards our physical/financial condition but also not in the same boat as regards our psychological condition and our ability to cope with stress. It is a time for a crash course in psychological training to deal with the stress.
I recently saw a video of a psychologist who suggested 3 interesting techniques to deal with Stress. Needless to say that there are many other techniques to cope with stress but I found these simple and practical to be implemented by anyone, hence sharing.
1. Act on the “Controllable” – Accept the “Uncontrollable”: Note on a paper all the “Problems” that you can perceive on the left side and on the right whether there exists a solution that you can currently work on to resolve the problem. Do whatever you can for the ones that you can, for the ones where no solution exists or you cannot work on it presently then put it in God’s bucket and say”God will solve this”. Later if you are worrying yourself about the same problem – refer to the paper and say that it’s already in God’s bucket and over time your mind will stop stressing over it.
2. Stop Negativity: Stop watching news/messages/statistics incessantly like your life depended on it and stop sharing information that you think would negatively affect people.
3. Conscious Relaxation: Close your eyes and consciously relax your eyes for a 20 seconds, whenever you can, you will find that your body and mind both relax.
This COVID Trauma seems to be in for the long haul and we don’t have any alternative but to prepare ourselves physically and mentally to cope with it with consistent exercises both physical and mental. Learn & consistently practice physical/mental exercises for your own good and for the good of your loved ones – since your stress not only affects you but also your loved ones. If you are in a position to be of help to others in any way, try to do whatever you can, whenever you can. Doesn’t matter if you haven’t tried all this before, the best time to start was yesterday, the next best time is today.
As a race we have been unable to decisively answer this question whilst the answer may seem obvious to us when we read but when put in the situation, we may choose otherwise. Look at the crowds at the political rallies, kumbh mela, … Are we blind to the fact that these very people would return home infected and the disease would spread?
The second wave is deadlier than the first, in a sense that people we know directly have been infected/suffering/passed away and yet we refuse to accept the “lockdown” conditions as essential for our very survival. Meteors may not be needed to wipe out the human form – we ourselves are capable of doing so and are running/sprinting towards it with open arms.
The idea of freedom appeals so much to us that we don’t mind even the body being sacrificed for it. This is the very basis on which revolutions are based – freedom over survival but surely we cannot use the same yardstick to deal with a pandemic that threatens the survival of the human race itself…
One can only hope and pray for Divine intervention – in terms of reducing the potency of the virus or making the human form somehow immune to the virus since human intelligence has acquired an Auto Immune Disorder and seems to be working against itself…This AIDs infected intelligence presumes that a dip at the Kumbh would be more effective than vaccination/other preventive measures lockdowns or better still perhaps attending a Political Rally would offer a better way of countering COVID…
We have managed to get ourselves into a much more concerning situation qua COVID than we were a year back. The vaccinations will take their own time to work and reach the herd immunity level but by then how many lives would be lost?
The current situation, more than ever, forces you to confront your mortality. If you don’t accept now, when will you? Life was never meant to be permanent as we hope and imagine, it will end and when? you don’t know. Whatever it is that you dream of “accomplishing” in life is rendered meaningless. Like it or not, that is how it is…
Awareness of mortality brings about 2 kinds of responses in people – One is that of fear and the second is that of gratitude/joy/bliss.
Fear is due to the fact that we feel that we are our body/mind and losing it means the end of everything. We are attached to experiencing life through body/mind and don’t bother to acknowledge the fact that there is life/soul within that is enabling the experience of body/mind. We clutch on with our dear lives to preserve this body/mind despite seeing all around that it is going to go some time…. and even then we are not prepared to leave…
All of us know that the best way to overcome fear is to face it which is the second path, of bringing the awareness of mortality in every moment and facing the fear till it no longer holds any sway over us. When the stage comes wherein you are no longer attached to the body/mind you experience an unparalleled freedom and a sense of gratitude/joy/bliss that emerges from within.
Life is never about holding on, it’s about letting go… Sooner you start accepting this awareness in every moment of your life, sooner you will find the bliss within…
Attachment denotes a tendency to possess whether it be in relationships or things or habits. Ultimately it is your habits, possessions, relationships that lend you an identity, define you. Attachment in Yogic terminology is “Raga”. If you observe, you will find that the opposite of what you are attached to is something that you fear or detest and generally avoid. This is “Dvesha” in Yogic terminology.
What we are attached to is the concept that something would bring us pleasure and what we avoid is that which we feel would bring us pain. We spend lifetimes upholding or repeating “Raga” and avoiding “Devsha” and thereby they become “vasanas” – tendencies that not only influence the choices/actions of this life but also are carried forward to next lives…
The solution to this is “vai-raga (Vairagya)” – detachment(Not renouncement), which in spiritual terms means being non-possessive. It means that you are involved but not entangled.
Remember what brings us pleasure also brings us pain, if denied to us. Especially in COVID times when we cant roam around freely, meet friends, go to public places we are denied the pleasures that we once experienced and hence it brings us pain.
What is required is acceptance of the times and situation and to do what is necessary as per our capability and most importantly to be happy with the choice regardless of the external situation. That is vairagya…
Vairagya during COVID times is gladly maintaining social distance/wearing a mask / getting vaccinated/ taking necessary precautions for your own protection / helping out others in need, etc willingly and happily. Else you are trapped in the raga/dvesha (pleasure/pain) cycle which is never ending. Only you can free yourself(by vairagya)…
A year has already passed since the lockdown was announced and we are still struggling with the virus and the changes it has forced/is forcing us to make with our lifestyles. Have we learnt anything from it? Yes that it is possible to live simply on as little, if the situation necessitates it. The attempts at relaxing the lockdowns have shown that people want to return back to their old lives, some out of necessity and some out of boredom – the effect of both is the same, the virus keeps spreading & creating havoc.
What is needed is that we take ownership of our own lives since that is the only way we can survive this pandemic. We have to reexamine the parameters which got us here in the first place. The crux of the problem is the way in which we choose to live life – it is a consumption oriented, accumulating kind of a lifestyle that brings about categories of haves/have nots wherein the have nots are forced to take risks for sheer survival. We compound the problems by introducing differentiations in terms of religion, caste, gender, etc and we then face a fractured social fabric which gives rise to situations like this in which even if you want to change, the social structure is beyond repair…
Going deeper, this is due to the fact that we have given importance to power, wealth, fame(PWF) as parameters of a successful life. Look around and assess for yourself the “successful” people, are they happy? No, they still want more PWF to keep surviving since they are like honeybees who only know to accumulate honey, but don’t know the purpose of that “honey”. What use is “honey” if it does not give you peace of mind? The point completely missed out in this chase is that the direction of the pursuit itself is wrong, peace of mind is a result of “letting go” not “accumulating”…
Change always begins with self, so if you start with yourself and take ownership of your life despite the pushes & pulls of the society, you would bring in the change. Start simplifying your life and move away from the consumption/accumulation oriented lifestyle to a more “Letting go” lifestyle – such a lifestyle besides being a reward in itself, would also leave a legacy worth perpetuating…
“Legacy is not leaving something for people. It’s leaving something in people” – Peter Strople.
“Never leave that till tomorrow which you can do today(Action)”;
“Why do today what can be done tomorrow?(Postpone)”;
and by extension “Why even do tomorrow what can be avoided altogether? (Avoid)”.
Having used all maxims at various stages in life, I can say that all have merits depending on the context/purpose for which it is used.
Action: Doing things gets you a sense of satisfaction having done something and you get a result to let you know whether what you did was right or wrong.
Postpone: By delaying taking action, either things would sort themselves out or you would get used to it.
Avoid: By ignoring it altogether you either save your energy or you have only postponed the inevitable…
Different people prefer different approaches – Action, Postpone & Avoid and all are fine so long as you know what you want out of your life since you don’t get replays in life. In the words of Omar Khayyam in The Rubaiyat “The moving finger writes; and, having writ, moves on: nor all thy piety not wit shall lure it back to cancel half a line, nor all thy tears wash out a word of it.”
You live in the notion that you have all the time in the world to do what it is that you intend doing and that you would have time for postponing and avoiding things and would deal with them later…The problem is that you think you have time and think that doing or postponing or avoiding will bring a result that would give you joy… The result, my friends, is in the future which no one has seen, life is here and Now! So whichever approach you prefer – action, postpone, avoid, be joyful in the moment for that is the only Truth and accept the result of your action as joyfully since it is the result of your doing…
“You are the sky. Everything else is just the weather” this quote of Pema Chodron beautifully conveys the concept of “Shiva” which lies beyond all that can be experienced & is the Source or the substratum on which existence as we know is created. We are limited by the ideas of time, space, word and atoms and therefore experience life in a limited way though our limited senses and understanding of existence. We try to conceptualise the motives behind creation but end up tying ourselves in knots.
Paramhansa Yogananda said “How to explain to the highest human faculty-reason, which reduces all concepts to cause-effect relationships – the motives of the uncaused God?” Somehow we claim to know everything that happens in our lives but nothing before or after it. All created things seem to be explainable in the middle, as we have seen, but are infinite and invisible in beginning and end. This mystery should spur man to trace the visible effect to the Invisible Cause, the Spirit which is “Shiva” which can be experienced when you let go of all artificial constructs of ego in deep meditation. The image/idol of Shiva as a Yogi in Deep Meditation is attempting to show a path which is invisible to the eye. Don’t get enamored with the idol or rituals, get enamored with what it is trying to convey – silence and meditation.
On this Auspicious Day of Mahashivratri, I wish you the courage to practice silence and meditation to allow Shiva to unfold to you from the very depths of your existence. You start this journey of unfolding by saying “Om Namah Shivaya – I pray to Shiva” and end it when you realise “Shivoham – I am Shiva”.
I saw a video on WhatsApp wherein the concept of heaven was explained through a metaphor to a rich man who wanted to take all his possessions to heaven. A wise person told the rich man that just as he had to exchange his currency when he travelled abroad, he had to get the currency of heaven before travelling to heaven – which is blessings through good deeds… Sounds good but if we stop for a moment and ask ourselves what is heaven, we will find that it is just a thought of continued pleasure post death. So we invest in some good deeds now so that we can secure our “pleasure” post death – much like a Provident Fund investment which secures your fund flow post retirement…
In other words our attachment to the cycle of fulfilment – seeking pleasure/avoiding pain is passed on to the next realm(if there is one, we are even not sure of that but doesn’t harm taking some insurance of doing some good deeds just in case…) Doing good deeds is always good but with what intention you do it would matter for your own evolution/maturity.
The problem is that we have experienced life only as a cycle of fulfilment and are so attached to it that we want it to continue in the next realm as well. It is this attachment to the concept of fulfilment and that life is “Out there” to be achieved or grasped that is the problem. Ask yourself when is it that you would have had enough? Never – you want to live forever and do the same things that you are comfortable doing that bring you pleasure. Now ask yourself can this happen? Obviously No. You observe it all around that everything is impermanent and yet you seek permanency of pleasures in life and in death…
This is the illusion that you must get over, no one else can do it for you. Meditation is the way to get over this illusion. When you go deeper you will find that you are not living an illusion, you are the illusion….
Bodhisattva 