The Escape
Most of us struggle with making correct decisions in life. Oftentimes, we are unsure if we are moving in the right direction. Amidst all such confusion, we begin to look for escape routes.
Do our choices and decisions affect the world? Do we drive the world? Or is the world driving us? Is the world driving us crazy? Or are we driving it crazy? It often seems complicated for us to lead our own troublesome lives. Then, who gives us the pen to write the destinies of others or even of ourselves? Shri Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita, “You are not the doer.”
The idea of diving into the soul might sound inconvenient. We love movement. We travel to far off lands in search of gratification. Some of us like to tempt our ever-hungry taste buds to savouries of cuisines from places unknown. Some of us prefer to indulge in all sorts of breathtaking adventures. Some of us can’t resist drenching ourselves in the absolute beauty of nature wherever we can find it.
Yet discontented with the delights available on the planet, some venture into space. And thus we endeavour to seize outer space and make it our own territory as well. Some others of us like to travel in time, recollecting the past, be it glorifying or disgusting. We do these to quench the insatiable thirst of the troubled mind.
Pleasure-inducing calm moments of gratification are always desirable. But we seldom entertain the uninvited guest of sad experiences. As soon as we sense melancholy creeping in through the backdoor, we want to flee to a land unknown. We want to go to a place where no one knows us so that we can immerse ourselves in oblivion.
At the same time, we want our mind to become still to get a closer look at life passing by. Why are we so afraid of delving deep into our own selves? What makes us scared of facing the fears erected by ourselves through years of hard work? Why do we run away from the choicest of blessings already there in the form of tender human feelings? Why are we so angry with the discomfort of our own choices made in the past.
It might be comforting to know that another such choice would not have led us to an altogether different life. Perhaps, our deepest demons wouldn’t stop scaring us, even if we chose a different route. The game of snakes and ladders does not depend on a single move.
Even the gloomiest of poets and the most attention-seeking of people often fail miserably at relishing the prize of sadness as it comes. They disrespect it with much disdain. When a rigmarole of calamities collapses steering the foolish mind into relentless capers of escape, making peace with our own sadness seems hardly an option.
However, meditation might come as a refuge. Delving into our own hollow dark selves, we let our emotions and feelings flow. Are the feelings, thoughts, and emotions separate from us? Why do they assume authority over our inconsistent mind that is ever driving us towards the measurable pleasure of certainty? And can something measurable that can endure the tests of time?
There is something within ourselves that always looks for expansion — infinite expansion. It won’t stop. It goes on searching for newer destinations, tastier delicacies, more materialistic luxuries, and unending progress. The search for a piece of peace’ is a craving in itself. Spiritualists desire to get rid of the craving for anything and everything? Isn’t getting rid, a craving, a desire in itself?
Ambition causes enough traction to let the one fly. Controlling the wind can be the sole aim of the failure of a pilot who is deliberately waiting to sail through the clouds. But it is hardly ever going to let the plane rise. Becoming light may instead be the first step. Leaving the unrequited baggage of ego could be the sole process.
If dissolving in the Self were so easy, there would have been no economics, no commerce in the world. The butterfly effect of commerce is huge, yet escapable. To dry up the desires while living in a factory of dreams is not easy. The path is thorny and needs perseverance and persistence to go through.
The thorns ought to be embraced. The pain needs to be savoured.
