Timepass

“The world isn't kept running because it's a paying proposition. (God doesn't make a cent on the deal.) The world goes on because a few men in every generation believe in it utterly, accept it unquestioningly; they underwrite it with their lives.” — Henry Miller

Today I kept one day off — off from work, off from the constant rush of doing something. I called it my “real upavaas” — not fasting from food, but perhaps fasting from unnecessary involvement with the world.

And strangely, even one day felt too little.

The world around is so rich — rich with people, music, literature, strange lives, beautiful souls. We only need to develop some interest in it for a while and forget ourselves a little.

It is interesting to see how important “I” and “myself” become in our daily lives. Every day we make such a huge issue out of ourselves whereas the truth perhaps is that we are only tiny sparks in this vast scheme of existence which was going on long before us and shall continue long after we are gone.

Our lives are momentary flashes which rise from dust and disappear back into it.

And yet within this small flash we live so many lives:
a son,
a friend,
a husband,
a wife,
a lover,
a parent.

Still, in every role, this “I” quietly keeps sitting at the center demanding enormous importance.

Why so?

Perhaps words make these things appear simpler than they truly are.

Because life is full of contradictions.

Even our scriptures are full of contradictions and as soon as one inner conflict settles down, another begins taking birth somewhere else. Sometimes I feel this is what Asuras in our mythology really signify — destroy one and many more rise again from nowhere. Perhaps the real Asura is not evil outside us but our own lack of wisdom which keeps recreating conflict again and again in newer forms.

A friend once told me:
“There is no use studying Gita when the same practical world exists outside. It only increases hypocrisy. Real life demands money, compromises, double standards. I will return to Gita after retirement.”

Interesting, no?

At that time I had no clear answer for him.

But now I feel that perhaps this contradiction exists only in mind.

Gita or any such knowledge is not really expected to create some dramatic outer change in us because then spirituality itself becomes another form of ego. Another identity.

A yogi is perhaps the one who outwardly appears just like any ordinary person but inwardly remains full of inquiry, awareness, reflection — always watching himself, always in yoga.

One may continue carrying out the same activities as before, meeting the same people and living the same life outside — but inwardly there is a subtle difference which perhaps only the person himself can know.

But the trouble is that such an understanding gives us very little opportunity to be praised.
What is the use if no one comes and tells us:
“You are great.”

Somewhere behind most of our actions there quietly stands this desire:
appreciation,
praise,
fame,
recognition.

And thus we burden ourselves unnecessarily while life itself keeps passing silently by.

I remember one story from the life of Gautama Buddha — from just days before his enlightenment.

After years of severe penance and self-torture, his body had reduced almost to bones. One day he sat beneath a tree when a simple village woman approached him carrying food in her hands and a child in her arms.
Buddha noticed a strange happiness in her face — simple, quiet, untouched.
He asked her,
“Are you happy?”
She smiled and replied,
“Yes. And happier still because you accepted my offering.”
Buddha asked again,
“Do you not desire anything more in life?”
She smiled and shook her head gently.
“I have a husband who loves me and a son we longed much for. I am content with what life has given me.”

It amazed Buddha that such a simple and profound truth should come to him through this unlettered village woman.

Such is life perhaps.

We torment ourselves trying endlessly to achieve something, prove something, become something, show something to others — and meanwhile the quiet joy hidden in ordinary life keeps waiting unnoticed beside us.

But yet again I say — it is not so simple.

Because perhaps nothing can truly be transcended unless it has first been experienced fully.

Buddha may not have understood so much from those simple words had he not first passed through years of struggle, ambition, renunciation, hardship, and restless seeking himself.

And perhaps that is why he moved ahead while many others remained stuck — because he kept rejecting every truth once it became too small for his understanding.

Truth keeps changing at different levels of consciousness.

To move further one has to remain humble enough to admit that what appeared complete yesterday may no longer remain complete today.

So perhaps understanding Gita or any deeper truth cannot really happen through borrowed belief. It has to become one’s own journey of experience where the self gets redefined again and again.

Truth shall change many times.
Life shall change many times.
And perhaps we too shall change many times.

But somewhere through all these changing truths one has to keep faith in life itself and remember:

“The world isn't kept running because it's a paying proposition. (God doesn't make a cent on the deal.) The world goes on because a few men in every generation believe in it utterly, accept it unquestioningly; they underwrite it with their lives.”