The Third Decade!

30 scorching summers went by, turning most leaves pale

The tree stood silent; come rain, sun or hail

Occasional springs were joyfully embraced while falls rhymed melancholy

And the rains came down steady, cleansing the grime slowly

Then the storms crashed in, withering defunct branches

Was I alone, under the shade or a herd in the ranches

The promise of 30 summers was never made, as the twig breathed scantily

Uprooted every winter, planted on new soils, the twig smiled readily

Watching other trees grow, the sky seemed unbounded

But then the frames changed, and so did seasons and the roots stayed grounded

Amidst joy, pain, hope and sunshine, here comes another decade

How tall could I grow, if in my embrace finds no one shade…

Profound Realizations III: Does the soul really move on?

Fascinating and exceptionally reassuring is the notion of our soul moving on after death. Backed by the highest and most ancient religious and spiritual scripts, the notion creates both fear and assurance. For now, God bless the soul who discovered fire – a more subtle of the five elements. It was windy by the sea beach as the moonlight made distant waves glitter. A 30 minutes struggle finally yielded a warm fireplace by the sea and the opportunity to gaze at the clear sky above in awe.

The comparison of an individual’s perception of “Self” to that of the waves has been a profoundly intriguing analogy. Like each wave in the sea may perceive itself to be a singular entity; but when you gauge the infinite sea blurring into the horizon, you know the wave was nothing but a tiny peck in the infinite – or perhaps, the infinite itself. And so is our daily illusion of the I-consciousness.

Deep sleep as I realize is the absolute state of being. Once asleep, our soul merges into the superconsciousness, uniting with the creator, the ever-present and endless. Physical awareness, and the 16 hours of being “awake” is a myth, a dream we all live each day.

The fire, true to its age-old nature had attracted many by the beach. Some needed a source to light their chimneys, while some needed warmth. Gokarna – a serene seaside town provided a rarely clean beach in India, beautifully isolated from the hustle of urban life.  Amidst the chatter, I focused on the waves hitting the rocky part of the beach at a distance. Does the soul really move on? Does it carry the karma, and the memories of its actions bundled inside, to its next bodily manifestation where karmic justice takes course? 

As my logic raced searching for answers, I couldn’t help but draw parallels with the paradox of ship of Theseus. Look at the waves. They strike the beach and are dismantled, disintegrated. What is formed after this event is new waves. Are these waves the same as the ones that hit the beach? Or are they newly created with only partial remnants of the waves that were? If the waves-hitting-the-shore is symbolic of the physical life coming to an end, how could the soul that moves out of the body, retain its uniqueness once into the astral or causal realms. How could the soul after leaving the body and uniting with the endless “mass” of superconsciousness, be separated from it yet again while retaining all its memories and report-cards from the past life? Would it not fuse with the rest of the ever-prevalent spirit and form a completely new entity, devoid of what it was, and what it experienced in its past embodiment. 

A theory like this could well shake our beliefs in Karmic justice. The fact that in the court of cosmos, justice is served to each soul beyond one lifetime in the physical realm. Who do cause and effect work on, if the soul that found another physical manifestation never was the same soul that it left as?

The past years of spiritual quest had drawn me close to all major religions, spiritual practices and beliefs, teachings of many self-proclaimed “Gurus” and self-realized beings. As a thorough observer; grasping each belief, soaking in each event, I travelled on. Only to realize, that when you travel round and round, your net displacement is zero. And how foolish could you be to attempt to measure your displacement in the infinite cosmos. Could a body of salt ever accomplish its dream of entering the sea to gauge its depth without melting away?

For now, it was the beach, the waves, and the comforting company of the fireplace.

Lets Shrink

“something through which I leave my mark, my impression…that’s what I want to do”. Apart from the emphasis on “want” and “I”, the other phrase that drew my attention was “leaving my mark”. 

Speaking of attention, I had attracted some already. The clock in the shopping mall read 9AM as the outlook calendar on my mobile flashed a meeting alert with a potential client. The mall was yet to yawn off the glittery pretences of last night and get on with another day. A battalion of thin men with blue shirts and striped black caps looked at me with a certain degree of disdain. Perhaps my shirt wasn’t creased enough, or the trouser looked too backdated. Or did I step too early into the mall where even the first movie show for college-bunking students (with steadily diminishing pocket money) started only at 10AM. Rushing to the nearest washroom mirror was the logical next step. Spiritual beliefs may discourage vanity but business demands a prominent physical presence. 

“I need to build something so they remember me” – the potential client went on. The potentiality of the client diminished with each of his Shah-Jahanesque remarks of building “something” for eternity. Coffee had been ordered and surprisingly served without a colossal delay by the half-sleepy staff subjected to an early start to the day. “I need to leave a footprint…”

Even as I made earnest attempts to take genuine interest in the conversation, a topic somewhat sensitive had already been broached. Man and his obsession to leave a footprint, to build identity and to be remembered.  

The discussion was yet to reach a crescendo and my mind could take peeping liberties to transcend away. The astronomical amount of fuel that would have been spent by airline companies, taxis, and buses transporting me in the past 3 years would perhaps suffice to burn a sizeable village in Norway or Nagaland – I wondered as I took my notebook out to scribble. And that would just be the carbon footprint. Add to it the verbal, mental, biological, auditory and visual footprint we leave behind throughout our lifespan. Each time one would drive that 4 seater car to the office all alone, or speak aloud on the phone, or litter plastic bottles at a tourist view-point, or get into an argument deceived by the I-consciousness; the footprint would only intensify, engraving itself deep into the physical world.

 

The meeting was followed by a day of routine urgencies and tenacious eventualities. Juggling through the events and driving past the busy streets, I could recount the numerous observations that several of my acquaintances, clients, and friends would have made. Why do you speak so softly; why honk only when it’s absolutely critical; why consume so little food; ….

The curtains to yet another theatrical episode of the earth-day were to be drawn. To applaud the efforts with other actors, I made it to a gathering of close friends. Toasts were raised, while loud music and louder accounts of aspirations, frustrations, passions, and complaints played on. Reflecting back on the day, I thought about this steady phenomenon which is engulfing a growing generation of mortal beings. Men and women around the world, moving to tiny 300-500 square foot houses; shrinking their needs, connections, impacts and their entire worlds*. With each ounce of desire being curbed, their minds would expand, setting them free of the compulsions and obligations of having to leave a mark. “The more we shrink, the more liberated we shall be”. I mumbled as my words faded away into oblivion.

* "We the tiny house people" - Highly recommended documentary

Why so cynical?

The urge to make cynical analysis of situations is far more tempting than reading abusive comments below Youtube links or watching TVF videos (vernacular) during prime work hours. Even as I took this rare opportunity to sip a cup of filter coffee in a Bangalore mall, my mind raced. Entrepreneurship in the past one year had added fizz to the functioning of the mind, while meditation played a balancing act annihilating it, bit by bit. Today, the mind raced still. 

“What’s happening to this generation”, I heard myself speak this cliché. Turning 30 is about a year away, which still qualifies me in “this generation” – I consoled myself. Young working men and women resting their physical mass on escalators; humming three-words-run-in-a-loop-several-times-turned-into-chartbuster-hindi-rap-song; hopping from one store to the other. Then to the food court, confused between unhealthy choices. “We are turning into a socially isolated, well profiled, routinely scrutinized pieces of data”. The thought suddenly made my coffee taste bitter. We have every reason to be worried. 

Step 1: Eradicate their brains - Large KPOs luring young talented minds into factory-work of coding, desk search, dashboards. Giant products and services firms outsourcing routine, mind numbing, low-value “tasks” to the east.  Odd night shifts. Templatized, hackneyed marketing and communication materials. Life coming to a halt only during traffic jams at crossroads where superiorly morphed astral projections of 3BHK flats, just about 1.5 Kms from somewhere, with all amenities; stand unchallenged in hoardings. All creating a fictitious projection of something one must attain tomorrow at the cost of today. Illusion within an illusion. 

Step 2: Slow’em down – From just about 30 ODIs per year back in the 2000s to gallons of T20s and domestic premier leagues each month. And then the corporate-enterprise-celebrity-backed football and hockey leagues. And the 4^th season of how-I-met-your-two-and-a-half-thrones. The large LED TVs available at EMIs – all ensuring you stay back at home throughout the weekdays and the weekends gazing at the glitter of semi-scripted theatrical work.

Step 3: Own their lives – Your favourite mobile chat app just sold your itinerary to the e-ticketing company as you pinged your friend about your plans to Ladakh. The online shopping portal auctioned your contact details to the scores of real estate developers who profiled you as a 2BHK-seeker vs. a vilament-aspirer. Your chamber of secrets, just paraded in the open.

What flashed in front of my eyes was apocalyptic. A cocktail of scenes from one of those Hunger Games genre of movies (read Maze Runner, Divergent, The Giver ..) where the big bosses watch while the average human leads an isolated yet scripted jungle life, following the herd and the commands. The coffee had turned into a saccharin potion. With routine clinical precision, I took the last sip, crushed the paper cup and threw it into the black garbage bin. Then to the escalator, the basement, the parking lot, the traffic…

Utopia in Exile

Rubbing my palms, I found myself regretting the decision to leave behind warm outfits. Travel light-is a thought that gelled well with my minimalistic approach to life. It was a misty February morning and I was eagerly looking eastwards for a ray of warmth. With the sun still shy, I had braved one full peripheral circle of the gigantic Namdroling monastery, gently (and sometimes forcefully) turning the silver colored prayer wheels while in my shorts and tee. Just about 20 hours back, I was this lone foreigner in a tiny 12-seater bus carrying Tibetan monks and natives to Bylakuppe. 20 hours later, the “foreigner” had become a thing of past, with every cell in my body resonating with the untainted surroundings.

Śunyata is a word originating from the word Śunya which refers to empty. Quintessentially, it talks about reaching a point where one is devoid of “I-consciousness”. The point where one is bereft of any “self” existing essence. The thought had been sown deep in my head by a book I had picked up the previous day, and accentuated by the talk I had with two monks while en-route to one of the largest settlement of a wonderful people in exile. Even as I was engulfed in the profundity of the word, I could not stop noticing the elderly Tibetans, undeterred by the steady wind, taking purposeful steps around the temple. Each time one of them passed by; the air resonated with heavy-bass chants (a practice known as overtone chanting or throat singing) that resembled the gong in the monastery. The wrinkled faces, the multi-colored Paang-dens (aprons) and the steady rolling of the prayer beads amidst thick fog created an unsullied imagery in my mind.

With the sky gradually emanating an orange tinge, human activity had started picking up. The young monks perhaps in their late 20s were the first to be seen. Offering a cup of tea made warmer with their act of compassion to the elderly, the monks readied themselves for another day of existential chores. The clean shaven heads and intriguing maroon robes painted a very homogenous visual, rendering them non-differentiable. This was perhaps the first step towards renunciation of the “self”.  However like all the prayer wheels that were identical, yet some had to be pushed harder than the others to turn them around, no two monks in their existential lives could be painted in the same exact colors. While some returned my attempts to start a conversation with a holy-indifference, certain monks were glad to spend several minutes explaining the root cause of pain, and the need to be self-aware, and the challenges with meditation and so on. I sensed conflicting thoughts there – aim at abandoning every act of self-actuality while retaining your existential individualities and innate idiosyncrasies!

By noon, I had made my way on foot to several other unobtrusive monasteries in little Tibet. It’s strange how we constantly combat the feeling of void or emptiness and question its origin and relevance. But isn’t it the very same component that the world we supposedly live in is composed of? If the world that we see is empty and an illusion, and that this emptiness is not relative but the absolute truth, then there certainly is a method in this madness. Emptiness isn’t then just a strange feeling we wake up with on certain mornings, but an intermittent manifestation and reminder of what we truly are. Our daily battles for existence would have perhaps rendered this very core part of ours into a vestigial phenomenon. I was jolted back to where I was by the fluttering of the prayer flags in the strong winds. In ages did I experience silence such pristine that I could hear, feel, breathe and almost touch it. Meanwhile, a steady breeze had carried the voices of several monks who had assembled in what sounded like a lunch gathering. It was strange to observe “discipline in chatter” for the voices were neither shrill nor shambolic, but picked up and plummeted together like classical music.

Curiosity had dragged my foot towards the hostel area where the monks studying Buddhism among various other disciplines resided. Cramped double occupancy rooms disseminating popular Bollywood music from the 90s caught my attention. I had still not been able to get over the childhood fixation of imagining lives of others. Would a prolonged hostel life make you more communal and hence dependent as opposed to being a recluse? Wouldn’t a monk’s mind wander out of the confines of the monastery walls into the city and the amusements it offers? A group of tiny 7-10 year old monks suddenly hurried past me. One of them while on a roll, sang Isska time to disco, not bothering what it meant. I had to control my urge to pick him up in a tight cuddle, for one is supposed to look up to them in reverence.

A whole day had passed floating between thoughts and aberration, hypotheses and interpretations. The visuals around me had changed now; leaving me constant in a moving frame. The bus would carry me back to a city of deception and deduced reality. My mind absconded out of the window wondering as usual. What if every entity we conveniently and “scientifically” termed as non-living had been able to renounce this false notion of self-entity way back in time and achieved Śunyata in absolute real terms? A group of Tibetan school kids returning from their vacations had been observing me off and on. Coincidentally when the stereo in the bus played this Tibetan pop song, all of them sang at the top of their voices with a shy smile on their faces. Only 2 English lines from the interlude I could catch hold of… “Thank you India, Love you India…”

Rebel Symphony No. 26 in E Major

“Born in Argentina, fought in Cuba, became a revolutionary in Guatemala, died fighting for the oppressed in Bolivia…” The very thought paints a picture of perfect liberation and emancipation of the conscious mind, intoxicated by a quixotic notion like that of a free-fall from a cliff while still being attached to a cause deep-rooted in your heart. The whole idea of gathering dry foliage; starting a fire with the deepest and most selfless of intents; nurturing it till it engulfs the whole forest; and eventually marching on to new grounds while passing the torch to the worthy fascinates and drives me each day.

Ernesto Guevara and the likes are metaphors for a deeper concept that continues to sweep away young, rebellious, non-conformist minds across the globe. Call it the lack of an established nomenclature for this phenomenon, or my ignorance of it; I am forced to coin a terminology for this. I would call it- being a Contract Revolutionary. I am discounting the likes of other great revolutionaries such as Simon Bolivar, or even Nelson Mandela who fought for a wide variety of causes and a wider class of people and nations, but stayed back in power for a long term development and unification of people. Here I only refer to the ones whose origins are very apolitical and more to do with matters close to their hearts. They are all around us, within us, amongst us, challenging the conventional, picking their heart over head, and moving on.

A compassionate mind is promptly drawn to any act that irradiates injustice, loss of human dignity or attempts of dehumanizing fellow souls in its very essence. Be it the oppressive regime of a dictatorship, the plight of farmers and the landless, denial of basic health and hygiene for the dignified living of a commoner, or even prejudices at work environment –all of these act as tiny pollens that germinate into rebels who choose either to strategically solve the issue and plan long term or into the ones who play the spontaneous, impulsive contractors. While the former may eventually turn into a conservative or a revisionary or even a reactionary; the latter remains an uncompromising revolutionary till the very end.

The likes of contract revolutionaries are driven by the very cause and the stir it causes in their souls. Never is power sought after or pursued, since it never was about attaining power or supremacy or proving a point. It always is a purely emotional decision taken by an unshackled heart that envisions the world to be a place of unchained existence, liberated thoughts and basic human rights. There’s a cause that hits your conscience and makes your heart bleed (the origin of which might be several thousand miles away). You put all your conviction and your very existence on the line, face your deepest fears head on, overcome the issue, move on and find the next cause. You don’t wait to rest under the shadow of the tree you would have planted. You walk on.  

Communism and socialism were mere tools that certain revolutionaries (only the apolitical, non-power hungry ones here) would have used at different points of history to fight for a cause. Countless stories of revolutionaries joining popular uprisings in a foreign country to bring down an unjust system, or start relief work for a country hit by a natural disaster, or set up health posts in poverty and epidemic stricken nations, leaving the comforts of a stable life behind is commonplace. In a more routine context, I see the likes of contract revolutionaries using tools such as music, social media, poetry, or even their freedom of speech in a closed meeting room to express the voice of liberated minds.

The phrase “move on” gives a rather escapist, adventurous and impractical tone to this whole notion. But when your entire belief system cries out loud, you would rather act and move on, than act deaf…

The Quilt Story

I had almost forgotten the soft, creaking noise of a bamboo hand fan. Back in the north-east characterized by frequent power cuts, it used to be the only source of liberation and respite in the pitiless summer several years ago. This afternoon, the hand-fan turns out to be the only entity breaking an eerie silence. It’s ironical that I find something as modest as my childhood in the most cosmopolitan cities ever!

Singapore it is and I am in a claustrophobic, 8-bed, windowless, back-packers lodge. Suffocation is imminent, even as my scruffily dressed roommates are barred from smoking inside the room. Every few minutes someone returns from the shower with a gush of cologne and soap that adds to the asphyxia in the dark room. For company, I have mosquito nets, matchbox-size lockers, John Grisham, soon-to-explode godzilla sized backpacks and 6 foreigners mostly from central Europe. Discussions are intermittent, most starting with a spark and fading off with cultural or perhaps circadian disconnects. The feeling is of effortless ease seeing species of my own kind disconnected in many ways, yet linked through the several lonely miles traversed by each. From the congested Favelas in Brazil to the dusty roads in Indonesia, I see these species at every corner of human inhabitation. You are not alone – is a comforting feeling.

“Fold the bed-sheet and keep at reception…” –the owner of the lodge barges into the room. A Chinese by birth, he was plump with his large belly bulging out of his vest drenched in sweat. To me, he resembled the Laughing Buddha (sans the “laughing” part of course). It was well past noon as the alarm clock indicated the guests, their time to vacate. There was an empty yet calm look in the eyes of the one moving out of the dorm. He perhaps envisioned the route to the next destination, the several sleepy villages on the way, the hardships of nature, the countless smiling faces, the sign-language discussions with natives substituting GPRS, or perhaps the lonely stretch ahead.

All good-byes with strangers are flamboyant to the eyes and are ritually finished off real quick. Backpacker Rob waves at all his companions of the dorm and is now on his way out with the only belongings he needs to give back to the world – a white bed-sheet and a quarter of an inch thick, striped quilt. One night back at the 11^th floor, as I lazed on my thick foam mattress, with the large French window opening into the city’s magnificent skyline, the luxuries of an urban life were just a phone call away. From the business hotel to a backpacker’s lodge – the transition was overnight. The exercise was to see the mirage of life up close. Wake up one morning to find you have lost it all. The code of life seems to be binary – either hold on to the amusements it has to offer or tread the green mile as a habitual nomad.

The humid afternoon was taking its toll. I walked out of the room for some fresh air crossing the reception. The quilt and the bed-sheet lying right next to the owner’s throne. As I stepped out of the lodge into the street full of Chinese food stalls, I looked back through the corner of my eyes. Buddha had laughed…