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Swami Suddhananda |
The man was hungry,
emaciated and sick. He was lying on the pavement with his eyes open
and was scanning the passers-by with a hope in his eyes that someone
among them would give something to appease his hunger. And then came
a marriage procession – the handsome groom on a horse, men with
regal attires, women most attractively dressed, happy children,
lovely music and all the lights of the world followed by exotic fire
crackers. They had drenched themselves with the costliest perfumes
and they were nearing the elegantly decorated marriage hall, where
the aroma of rich spicy dishes was wafting to fill the air around.
In fact, the whole experience was a naked assault on the senses. The
sounds, the touches, the forms and colours, the aroma of the dishes
and the fragrance of the perfumes worked up a frenzy and the whole
marriage party was totally unaware of the surrounding including the
sick, hungry man lying and begging on the pavement.
If the revellers did not register the presence of
the hungry, the hungry could never relish the sensation of the
evening. His hunger, his sickness and the consequent inability to
keep himself alive had taken the toll and for him the passing
glamorous procession was more a nightmare than a dream.
When the living, very life is in jeopardy, the
experiences of the senses have no charm. For that man on the
pavement, the most beautiful sound shall be the sound of somebody
calling him for food or pouring some foodstuff into his tin vessel.
The most beautiful touch shall be his fingers touching the food and
the most beautiful sight would be his eyes feasting on his hands
holding the food and pushing it into his mouth. The most beautiful
taste shall be the taste of just any food that is on his tongue for
him to swallow down the throat and the most enticing fragrance shall
be the fragrance of the food that shall ultimately reach 'his'
stomach.
He or she shall be his love, his god, his faith,
his blessing who shall provide him the means of sustenance. All
other people, gods, faiths shall be as nightmarish as the passing
marriage party which he can observe but can never participate.
If such hungry people are millions in the world,
who are physically famished and empty, there are also millions and
millions who are sick, empty and hungry in their minds lying in the
decorated homes, stately mansions as well as ordinary homes and
streets. The same beggar can watch yet another procession of the
same bride and groom going two different ways to reach the court of
law to annul their union. The glamour has faded. The fire in the
body no more burns for the other.
As even the hunger of the stomach has no interest
in sensations of any kind, so also the emptiness within has no
enthusiasm to recognise any passing sensation. The ranches, the
mansions, the cars, the travels, the men, the women and the exotic
food or places no more hold any charm. When the hungry beggar on the
pavement is there for everybody to see, the empty and lonely man is
hidden from the sight of the world in his isolated room in a hamlet
or in a palace. Even the positions that they occupy are as sterile
and a drab as their inner loneliness, emptiness is.
Because the well-fed rich is lonely that does not
mean the hungry man need not be fed or become prosperous. What it
conveys is that if the poverty does not solve the problem of
physical hunger, the prosperity does not solve the emotional hunger
or the subtle emptiness. The material prosperity at least has the
ingredient to supply enough means for satisfying the physical
hunger, but the material poverty is equally incapable of satisfying
both the physical and subtle hunger. So, at no time, the poverty or
the forced denial must be romanticised as the solution to any
problem.
Therefore, the prosperity, the enrichment of the
individuals must be encouraged. We need the genius, the scientists
or artists, the professionals and the ordinary workers to be
productive and create enough material prosperity to feed and sustain
the world in the face of cyclones, epidemics and earthquakes. When
simple methods of cultivation can provide for a few, the scientific
methods can create a glut in the food grains to the comfort of the
hungry but to the chagrin of the retailer, a middle man who knows
how to make money without touching the land, water and the heat!
That is when education becomes a blessing where
the man is made to observe the climate, the plants, the seeds, the
seasons, the pests, their control and ultimately to reap the
bounteous harvest. Even the studies in the weather pattern warn the
farmers of the possible danger and they now know how to circumvent
the impending disaster.
The hunger of the body is the most important
immediate need of every individual to be taken care of, without
which no other sound, touch, colour or fragrance would be
meaningful. While educating people on survival, everybody naturally
moves into the survival or living with comfort and happiness. There
the subjects like physics, chemistry, botany, zoology or any such
science attempts to explore the nature of things and exploit the
laws of the universe to create things that add to the human comfort.
Food and its varieties, dresses for different seasons, vehicles for
travel, advanced communication systems, the life saving-drugs and
the antidotes to disease have tremendously contributed to the
comforts of man.
But these comforts, while making the person
materially rich and prosperous, have left him comfortably
uncomfortable, prosperously miserable. Here the discomfort or misery
is no more a physical attribute but an inner disposition that
equally afflicts the rich and the poor. The poor is so busy fighting
physical hunger, disease and discomfort that he has no time and
leisure to recognise the inner emptiness. Nor does he have the time
to enjoy the bounty of sensations inherent in Nature.
In the absence of a physical struggle for
survival, the rich and the educated have moved into emotions and
encounter the limiting emptiness of the individuality which is
constantly compared and confronted to feel superior or inferior.
Such a person is unstable, insecure, empty and strives to gather
more and more riches that happen to be the symbol of material power.
Will the riches of the whole world fill up that
emptiness within? A simple short answer is ‘no’. It cannot because
the inner emptiness in the first place is not caused by the riches
of the world to be filled up by it. The sense of emptiness comes
from a sense of limitation of the individuality. The ‘I’, unaware of
itself, grabs every thought that comes in the way and creates
million identities for itself.
There the present education appears to be a curse
although the purpose of the education is to make the individual
happy and comfortable. Yet there is no other way out to make life
physically comfortable except through education as available today.
And the inner emptiness that appears exaggerated because of the
physical prosperity and education must be dealt with the insight
into the individuality which feels empty and lonely.
The body is not afraid of death. Neither does
time target only one body. There is no fear for the body and death
by itself is not frightening. The individuality is afraid because he
feels “I am dying”. The “I” drags the changing and dying condition
of the body to itself and thereby frightens itself.
Therefore, the education, (prosperity and
achievements) which seems to strengthen the individuality and make
him feel vulnerable, insecure, empty and unfulfilled in direct
proportions, must have an added element to create the Self-awareness
– the ultimate self-definition. The individuality that assumes the
false strength and weakness by identifying itself with many roles,
must be challenged, questioned and analysed.
Instead of challenging and understanding the ‘I’,
often methods are used to escape from its tyranny. It hides itself
in an entertainment as even it is done helplessly in deep sleep
state. Forgetfulness of limitation seems to provide some relief and
often the religious practices are extensions of many secular
entertainment, where the individuality is suspended under the spell
of rhythmic singing, chanting, rocking, dancing or breathing. Such a
personality becomes a Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde as the ‘I’ alternates
between two sets of secular and religious identities. If pure
secular identity creates an identity crisis, the religious
identities too add to the crisis for the individual.
That is why the ‘individual’ must know his own
nature without attempting to dismiss, change, add or invoke any new
role. The Truth of the individual is not a role. It is the ultimate
self definition where nothing defines it or defies it.
The time is ripe now for the present generation
to recognise the problem as it is. No more can we delude ourselves
that the formal education, food, shelter and prosperity will solve
all human problems. Nor can we romanticise poverty, renunciation and
denial of any kind as the means to fulfilment. Both poverty and
prosperity can compound the problem of the individuality.
That is how as even the hungry man on the
pavement remains oblivious to the passage of a colourful procession,
the empty, lonely and unfulfilled within too shall remain oblivious
to the majestic presentation of the creation. The prosperity, the
human relationships, the power and all such apparent attractions no
more excite him. The loveliest sound, touch, forms, colours or
fragrance will be that which can take away his loneliness.
Loneliness or emptiness is not the absence of a sound, touch, taste,
forms or fragrance, etc., and, therefore, no sense perception or
sensation can fill that void. If the initial void appears to be
because of poverty, sickness and hunger, etc., the prosperity,
health and food fill it up. The physical hunger can be satisfied
with gross, physical objects and experiences. The ‘thought’ of food,
clothes, shelters or a person cannot satisfy the physical hunger,
the nakedness, shelter or the need for proximity. Thoughts being
subtle cannot satisfy the hunger of a gross dimension.
Similarly, the hunger within, the emptiness of a
subtle kind which is recognised after a lot of gross experiences and
achievements, cannot be filled up by the gross objects. Even the
empires and universes can be swallowed up by the black hole of
emptiness within. A king behaves like a poor man, a billionaire is
desperate for attention, the most powerful is hungry for recognition
or a little love and attention.
Here the loneliness or emptiness is not the
absence of anything or lack of food, shelter or education. Here the
loneliness is in spite of the presence of all kinds of prosperity.
The man has already passed through the physical prosperity,
emotional entanglements and excitements and the intellectual
idealisms. He might have even dabbled with some bizarre religious
practices to experience an exotic nothingness or to be spaced out
for an extended period of time through drugs or forced silence in
the lonely spots. He might have even indulged in the same food, sex,
music, breathing or experiencing - anything with a religious slant
to make it mystical and mysterious. But at the end of it all it is
the same food, same sex, same sensation and it matters not how
slowly, how fast, how meditatively or how mindlessly he goes through
it all.
He, the individual, survives all experiences and
the ‘experiencer’ is tired and lonely at the end of the longest
journey as even he was restless and tired in the beginning of the
journey, being unaware of the ultimate destination. He has moved and
wished for the rest at the end of all movements. His only rest was
the pause between the two movements – incapacity to move because of
sheer exhaustion from the last relationship or experience. The
pointer, therefore, clearly indicates towards the individuality
itself as the greatest sound, touch, taste, smell or form to be seen
as he is where there is no sound, touch, form, colour, taste or
smell. Nor is there any emotion or concept.
It is time we ‘know’ ourselves without being the
‘knower’ and then continue to explore the world and the physical
laws to make the world physically tolerable, comfortable and
healthy. And the Self-knowledge will make natural enrichment of
emotions and the intellectual insights. Life will be wholesome and
nobody or nothing will be holier than the other.
This must be the part of our education or any
teaching forum. Then we would have all awakened people and they
would have an enlightened choice of being a beggar or a king, a
renunciate or most involved, a Brahmarishi or a Rajarishi.
Let us exercise the choice and help others
exercise their freedom to choose!
Swami Suddhananda
Swami Suddhananda
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