Arriving at Freedom (Equilibrium 7)

I was frantically searching, asking, looking for something. I didn’t know what because I probably was afraid of what I knew I would find. When we reach a long desired destination then we still by default go on searching. It’s like the dog who turns round this side and that side frantically many times before finally sitting down. Reaching the most important goal of life, feels like that; not able to accept that we have arrived, that we will have to search no more, go nowhere, sit now, ..for ever!?

So I decided that what I was searching, was a meditation that could lead to centering on oneself, to thoughtlessness, as thinking too much is the door to madness!.( But in my eyes “I AM thinking”, so was I searching how not to be me? How to put an end to myself? That was already disturbing my equilibrium!)

'What you are searching for is already there’. I usually take a book to read as I wait for my son's school bus. That day I grabbed a book in random, hurridly glanced at it: Oh no! J Krishnamurthy” It was one of a set of books my husband had brought months ago which I had abandoned after the first two pages. Titled “Beyond Violence” Something I had thought was beyond me! Shucks; no time to select another book, I thought and took the book anyway. At the stop I decided to read as I usually prefer..in random. And there it was! My husband had, as alway, brought to me the right book!

There it was the chapter- ”Meditation! To Meditate is to be Aware. It told me that one cannot stop thinking, but that one needs to distinguish thinking from awareness. To think is to use past memories and data to process current data. Thinking can breed pleasure and fear. Awareness on the other hand is seeing and comprehending the truth without judging, without fear, without pleasure.


It is difficult to write when you have to include the name Krishnamurthy. I will try anyway. Well, going by Krishnamurthy’s (ahem) ‘thoughts’ (He would have sneered at that word 'thoughts'!; by his ‘analysis’?, no he hates that word too, heck 'thoughts' it is!) I realize that in ‘awareness’ (the only word he seems to like…uh huh ‘like’?) there would be no conflict, no movement, just a standing still.

Do we know “no movement”? We only know movement! We know what the feeling is of 'conflict', of the pull to reach some where, or the polarity of good bad, right wrong, past future;a movement from what is, to what should be. But really, what is it to have reached the ultimate destination with nowhere to go? Can we handle what it is to have arrived. To arrive means ‘not trying to escape anything and not trying to move towards anything’.


This is a painting I made six or seven years ago describing which I wrote a poem in 2009.

Conflict

Dreams fly and soar,they are wings fluttering free
Truth grounds and floors,it is earth rooting me
Am I free am I rooted, or ‘conflict’ in entirety!

Oh the sky has its pull, but the earth has its hold
Yet mind is never still, though the past put in mould
Yes, there are the wishes....then there is the practicality!

I move to a future, then move back to a past
I am pulled, I am held, I am tearing apart
Oh I stop the striving, ‘Pull apart to a rarity!’

The light shines on me, but darkness doesn’t leave
In my hands there is joy, but inside there is grief
Bright.. the ideals, untouched...reality.
We are fed into a particular view from our childhood but reality seems different. So we are confused, we are in conflict; like the plant rooted by the earth and also reaching towards the sky. As long as we depend on something, as basic as the earth to stand on, as basic as beliefs, we are conflict. As long as we are searching for the sky, for understanding, we are conflict; for we stand on some beliefs which don't free the mind as it strives towards freedom of thought. As long as we are thinking we are conflict as we are interpreting ‘what is to know’ according to our limited collected “what we know”. How can we learn just to observe with freedom, to be aware, to be free of conflict even as we walk through this mysterious journey of life?


'Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me' Psalm 23;4 seems very comforting. How beautiful I used to think to be shepherded by The Lord to the destination. But infact this verse 4 in the psalm 23, also means a path of darkness, and possibilities of straying and so descipling, using the rod and staff to keep the sheep, from wandering! It can mean a lot of pain when we don’t realize when to let go of a past and walk towards future.

I have seen that whenever I hold on to a place and do not want to leave it, everything I valued there quite visibly starts to deteriote and then I become more willing to leave it. Sometimes despite the signs we may still hold on until it becomes unbearably painful. Or when I run from something that I should confront, then I find I have only run into the same situations repeating, and I realize I have to stop running and confront. Rod and staff indeed!

I sometimes wish I shouldn’t want anything that the "Shepherd", the Lord doesn’t wish rather than be hit so painfully. But I also realise that to "let go" has a certain strengthening factor, it develops independence, to enjoy the grass and yet leave when the rod gently taps. With time trust also develops; that this tap is for my good. The tap then becomes comforting, a sigh that I am watched over. Learning thus not to become dependent on any pleasure, learning to enjoy the new path, trusting the shepherd to know the right way and letting go with that faith over any personal desires.

When we let go with faith, some day we realize what we were looking for we already have, for what we look for comes with us, travels with us just as we travel with the Lord and leave everything our dreams our wishes with trust in him. 'My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.' John 10:27 What is really ours is always with us and is never separated by birth, death,or eons.

Could the moment of trust be a destination? But what is the feeling of having arrived at the destination and having nowhere to go, nothing to pursue.How do we recognize it and what happens after? Where to from nowhere! ? Would we be frantically looking this side and that side, turning round and round, not sure how to sit down! Could Krishnamurthy help us sit?


From Krishnamurthy what I basically take away is the intent to free each moment from the past experience and the future experience and arrive at the present experience. I know all intellectuals say that but he explained why we hold on to a past or move towards a future we would like. And why even love as we understand is in fact violence!. According to him it is fear that makes us hold to past pleasurable experiences because we are afraid of losing it, we want to recreate it in our future Love brings pleasure and the dependence for pleasure and then this pleasure brings the fear of losing it, it brings in the violence of jealousy. These are thus all interconnected. Love and violence are the same energy, the energy of division. A movement from what is to what is wanted, desired.

He gave a very powerful example, simply stated; If we saw a wild animal say a lion, we recognize it as danger and would we not as a result try to get away from it? In the same way if we really saw that love is in fact violence, a danger, we would not want it anymore!

Krishnamurthy takes repeated readings to understand intellectually. It takes many more days to understand experientially. It takes confronting. We have to confront our fears or pleasure (if u confront one you are confronting the other too!). Lets confront then - If my thoughts are producing fear, it means I am running away from something? What? Loneliness? Let me look at all around me, Is anybody going to stay with me for ever and ever. I will die, they will die. Then? I, my spirit is alone, all are alone. Nobody carries anything or anybody.

How long will any person be with you can you tell? Who can u say will be with you for ever and ever as long as ur spirit is? Not any earthly body surely.

I accept loneliness as the truth of me, of all mankind. Nobody is there for anybody eternally! That is what I knew and was running away from, afraid of accepting. There is nothing to what is generally called love and togetherness!
When I finally confronted, I felt liberated, joyful. I am lonely! (yeahee) I had feared I would be shattered by the truth that was knocking at my consciousness for acknowledgement for a long long time. "Confronting" I realized is the process that helps move from 'thought' to 'awareness'! The worst moment is just before we confront our fear. The truth on the other hand, is indeed liberating. The truth made my heart laugh in its realization! Everything there is, is just me. My whole universe is me, for ever and ever and ever! I am complete in myself?! Life is ephemeral, everything any man may seek, love, fame, success is all ephemeral; then why seek it? Seek something that is for ever and ever and ever. Seek the self, one's own eternal soul, one's own only companion.

Filling our life with love is evading the truth of our completeness, by ignorance we see completeness as loneliness and so we try to fill our lives with love as an attempt at running away from the truth and then this love brings in fear of losing it (it never was a part of 'everlasting' and our heart knew it), that brings in efforts to preserve it, brings in jealous anger.

The escape from this lion, towards freedom is only in confronting the truth that love and togetherness is a lie. That nobody can be there for anybody for ever. We are our own universe .

Loving is merely loving oneself, but centering on oneself is not selfishness.When we realize that nobody can be there for us, we have only one option, of being there for others. Devoid of the need for another, the need for pleasure, the need for words, comfort, support, such a complete person relates to others in fact in a much better way, ‘without expectations’. When our cup is full, it flows out, when we arrive, we become the channel. Jesus said “I am the way”.When we become fully aware to Jesus, as he shepherds us, we arrive. When we arrive, 'sitting down' means becoming the way, the passage, the channel for the Divine Love that is the Shepherd Jesus.
There is that lovely Hymn “Make me a channel?

The last stanza
“ Make me a Channel of your peace.
It is in forgiving that we are forgiven
In giving to all that we receive
And in dying that we are born to eternal life”

Whatever you do to others good or bad, you do to yourself. Don’t we see, If we cannot forgive ourselves small things, we cannot tolerate others either. When we can forgive others big things we can forgive ourselves too. When we support we get support by default, two people holding each other. When we see no purpose to anything in the world, we stop pursuing, we arrive. When we rise above our fears, give up that which we think is a requirement for our happiness, we get happiness, the freedom from fear. When we give up searching, we find, the truth alights on us. When we embrace the sorrow we are running from we are freed of it. Giving up the ephemeral world, we get freed of its conflict and gain the eternal self. When we are neither held to the ground nor trying to reach the sky, when we are as blank as the space, we are free. When we desire not this way, nor that, we are free of the pull on either side. When we stop resisting, stop reaching out, when we are still, we arrive.

We then live not in some expectation some hope. We embrace each moment as a new gift without the burden of the past or of the future. When we accept our loneliness we are complete. Its in turning in, centering in onself, embracing ourself, that we embrace all

Receiving and Giving ... Criticism!

I, a Virgo by sun sign, know that it is easier to give criticism than to listen to a criticism! To my defense I would say as is said for Virgos, that it is not because we deny our faults (if we do see it! ) but because we already have our own finger so painfully poking at our worst faults that we can’t bear another finger on it.

So let me start with what is more difficult; Receiving Criticism. Accepting that there is a need to change is what is required and is half the battle won. My biggest challenge has been my occasional but volcanic temper (allow me to blame it on paternal inheritance) I saw and accepted it as my biggest fault. I am usually soft and loving but occasionally I am capable of erupting like a volcano, and then the lava becomes beyond my control and it has to exhaust itself. After that blind hour,it’s the huge mess left to clear, the burnt hurt feelings that are piercingly visible after the destruction, that leave me with a lot to reconstruct and a lot to be regretful for long, which brought in again and again a desire to change.

But as long as people still understood, loved and accepted me, I only 'struggled' to control my burst outs quite ‘unsuccessfully’. Some friends would joke on it (when they saw me read book on Anger Management), or call it “Full Power time” (when blinded to “Who” I blew out at). It was only when I was rejected for my temper that I put 'my all' to ‘managing temper' and realized that I could indeed overcome my insurmountable weakness. Managing did not mean I stopped being a critic or that I never lost my temper but it meant I took care to notice the building steam and accepted it to myself and so removed it before it became volcanic and more destructive than intended. That is, I learnt to notice and pour out my emotions at a level where I could manage it calmly, rather than ignoring it till it burst out; shocking me and others.

But in that process I learnt that sometimes rejection can be the greatest incentive to change and that we can even keep ‘rejection’ as a tool in our kitty to use in rare instances (for a short while only of course) where acceptance may have been the spoiler!

Rejection added to criticism is difficult to bear but there are a few things that experience taught me that minimized the sting I feel while at the receiving end of ‘due or undue’ criticism.

1. We can bear to listen to all types of criticism, if …..we don’t have a perfectionistic expectation from ourselves. That is if we can first accept ourselves as we are, and then accept others as they are (not expecting them to know how to criticize constructively)! Once we accept, we don’t feel (and cannot be made to feel) worthless for our faults.

2. We need to accept that perfection is impossible; quite plainly because what is perfect for one maybe imperfect for another! This does not mean we cannot or need not strive to reach our idea of perfection; but rather it means to realize that as individuals we have our limitations of the areas we can achieve perfection in. That is to say, we cannot meet every ones subjective ideas of perfection! (Well, even thinking that is exhausting!) What is important then is sincerity in all we undertake. We can only strive to do our best in whatever is a requirement.

3. We have to realize that perfection can never be a requisite for acceptance. In fact it is the little imperfections that set one apart from another and only a person who is incapable of truly loving, would demand perfection. We often fall in love with a particular character that either compliments who we are or is very like us, or is very like someone in our family and so has a comfort factor. Love is easier to understand if we remember that we develop a love for animals as well! I love dogs, I love cats! What does that mean? It means there is a particular character that we may be drawn to. Strength? You probably love Elephants. Loyalty? You love Dogs. Beauty? The cat family maybe. Energy? Squirell the cute busy body!. On the other hand if it is Smartness? You love intelligent Humans. Goodness? You love empathy in Humans. Perfection? Sadly you can only love God. Because like God, we can only imagine perfection!

But it is true that ‘good’ people are more often looked out for ,as partners. A friend recently told me about how people helped each other selflessly when the earthquake (plus tsunami and nuclear) disaster happened in Japan in March 2011 and wondered if the “civility” was as a result of their high average IQ as compared to other countries or it was their strict adherence to civil attitudes that resulted in comparatively higher IQ in them. (i.e whether “being good” was the cause or the effect of High IQ)

I realized then, why “goodness” is so attractive! Wasn’t civilisation itself the result of superior brain power in man as compared to animals! We instinctively look for the more civil the more “good”.
But it is quite observable that highly intelligent (smart) people can also be highly aggressive and selfish, not very capable of handling emotions and caring for others. So surely High Emotional Quotient (EQ) rather than High Intelligence Quotient (IQ)could be the cause of being a “good” samaritan.
And I also believe EQ can be both the cause and effect of Goodness. That “becoming civil or good” can also result in increasing the EQ. Of course all this is speculation with no tangible proof, but what I am leading to is that ‘a critic is a friend, who can help us develop our emotional quotient.’

What's the benefit of 'the Goodness'!? “Being good” takes us to a higher plane of existence. Personally it can expand our aura to the seventh level. Socially it can take us to a perfectly civil and good world. But from there where?

The whole universe is said to work on the principle of Giving and Receiving,and I really believe that it is indeed the one basic principle! I imagine the play of the universe like a game with many levels(compare with a computer game). Life on Earth is one of the levels with seven levels (or heavens) above (just as we exist in several planes as well). There are many lessons to be learnt on this earth that help to perfect our game plan and escape to the next level. What's the use of winning this game? Each level leads us closer to perfect Bliss! We can expand to the seventh level from the first level. That's about all we can know, but once in the game we just have to play it to the end. There is simply no meaning of getting bored or tired with the game; no meaning to quitting!

Everything we do, all we journey with or meet along our journey are just mutual helpers in the learning. No man can grow much as an island. We all need each other. Whatever lessons our subconscious has been wanting to learn, another may be more equipped to provide us with and so they are the ones we meet in the journey. We may push them away but they stay or keep coming back into our lives till they deliver their lesson; on the other hand after having learnt a lesson, no matter how we try to hold on to someone, they are out of our lives, or become passive in our lives!


I heard somewhere that “those who come into our lives are like postmen who have come to deliver our mail’. We have to respect them as that even if it is a criticism they delivered. True, whatever the content delivered, how can a postman be blamed! We might at worst kill the postman, but in another time or in another lifetime another postman will come to deliver the same message until we learn it. It is always better to take it the first time around.
How? I once asked a friend how he is able to listen so attentively to a particular “boring teacher”. He said, “We only learn as much as we respect another” That was one valuable lesson! Indeed, the lesser our ego and feelings of superiority, the more the lessons we can learn from the other to guide our conduct in life that in turn earns us the higher plane of existence.

Now there can be times when we may have to serve as the postman and deliver a post no matter what; to do the role of delivering criticism! And that brings me to the sermon this Sunday. The topic was that we all have a purpose although we may not fully understand what it is. Some main points were- All of us are in a way prophets and priests; the names we have are god given names which point to our purpose and so we should search the meaning of our names. He further said that the prophet’s duty is of speaking the truth, whether he is listened to or not and no matter that speaking the truth always has severe consequences. John the Baptist (meaning of John is God is Gracious) was beheaded when he spoke the truth. That's often the price of speaking the truth. The priest continued saying that Prophets are also very human, they had their failings and weaknesses that they had to struggle with. St. Paul asked God three times to remove a particular weakness but it did not happen. When he realized he had to live with that weakness he said, "For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Corinthians 12:10).The Priest explained it to mean that in our weakness, we rely entirely on the strength of God.

We all have our failings that we struggle with and which come in the way of our purposes. Sometimes our purpose is delivering a post against our weakness, say a weakness for love (I am definitely not going to be loved for this “dirty Job”of criticising!), despite lack of trust in its usefulness (it’s only going to spoil it for me and do them no good either!), despite fear of the consequences (wonder where I will end this time!). Indeed, when we do a deed because it has to be done in spite of all our weaknesses pulling us down, that is when we would have shown strength!

I have known that bitter truth, no matter how lovingly, tactfully and calmly presented will not fully lose its bitterness and bite and hence possibilities of a kick back! But then I also know that a critic, a teacher can only extend his hand full of the wealth of wisdom; whether the lesson is taken from the hand or whether the hand is spit upon depends entirely on the student; depending on whether the student can recognize it as wealth or only see it as filth.

I am reminded of something Jesus had said: 'No servant is greater than his master.' If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also. If they obeyed my teaching, they will obey yours also.’ John 15;20. It is really ignorance to be bothered about the result when we have to be the postman, because our first allegiance is towards our creator who assigns us a job and only after that to our own analytical mind that can never fully comprehend God’s ways. It is also ignorance to be bothered when we are ‘shown our place’ because how we are treated tells “not where we stand but rather where the receiver stands in terms of spiritual development”. No matter if we are not listened to, are insulted, rejected, hurt or even killed, we have to remember that there are no purposes in life greater than delivering what has been assigned (when it is our turn to deliver) and receiving as meekly as is possible for us (when it is our turn to receive).

Cap it Now not Later!

An easy going attitude can be a virtue as well as a fault! Rather than being uniformly easy going in attiutude, I believe it is more favorable to know - where to go easy and where to be firm and being able to follow through with that knowledge! But what we often see is, mountains made out of molehills and molehills made out of mountains! Much of the evils in life are the result of being firm where we should have gone easy, and going easy where we should have been firm.

As another child falls into an uncapped abandoned borewell and dies(June 20), one cannot but pause and feel guilty along with the nation for having gone easy on the first offender years ago who did not follow the regulation of capping an abandoned borewell. If only the media had made it a point to do a follow up after the first such incident covered six years ago(Prince) and shown the nation not only the drama of painful circumstances but also the grimness of what happens to the offender, then the many following deaths could have been avoided. If only a punishment grim enough had really been meted out then, to create enough fear, it could have prevented such callous attitudes in serious matters as this.

As I flipped through the biography of a gangster "Dawood" who went on to be the cause behind terror in India, I came upon a passage that told me his beginnings in a small conning gang. "As they got away with little offenses they grew more and more confident that they could get away with anything in the country"! And I knew then, that its again our fault; if the soicety had made it a point to severely punish the first offence, it would have nipped crime at the bud and society would not become responsible for terror and thousands of deaths in the nation.

Sometimes forgiveness and mercy is a worse sin. As the little girl Mahi called out to her father to save her out of the borewell, his father could do nothing but wait outside helplessly for three days. The whole world joined together to pray to God the Father for the life of the girl, and still He did not intervene either. If we don't learn when a life is spared as with Prince, what do we require to learn?...A Mahi? (a name which means "Earth Goddess"...)

I have seen that when an issue repeats in our life, it means only one thing; we haven't learnt our lesson with the first. What is the lesson we are not learning in this and other issues in our country? Why are we too kind to callousness and to the likes of Kasab who go on a killing spree? In being kind to one life we are being unkind to thousands of innocent lives in future who may be suspected to be another Kasab,another Dawood, another uncapped borewell.

Are we too much of the forgiving kind? No, not really! We are merely hypocrites. If we (the common man) see one frivolous error in a man who likes to walk the straight path, we are quick to point it out. Why? It is because he is "affected" by his faults and because we enjoy his discomfort in being affected.

But we see "ourselves" in the likes of people who leave a bore well open for saving expenses; we see "ourselves" in a Dawood who in a lust of money, manhood and power showed so called "bravado", "cleverness" and "manliness" in his growth to a Don; which a "man cant help appreciating", in spite of everything it meant eventually. There is no fun in criticising and punishing "ourselves" for having saved some effort and money in capping a borewell, but yeah 'such fun' in pricking the perfectionist as a duffer and good for nothing, over say an umbrella he failed to take! We see ourselves in people who lust the world and not in people who love the good and so we pick the wrong, frivolous battles to fight!

We do have to be wise and not frivolous in choosing our battles. . But I reiterate what I wrote before....If we laze out of the first worthwhile battle, we create for us a worse and woeful war to fight someday.

Fighting for our Spaces

Apart from the convenience of being totally understood, there are also a lot of household tips to gain from having a married woman as a friend in the neighbourhood. But since last four years I have not had such luck, (although I have had unmarried friends, which does not give the same benefits). It was frustrating until one day I decided; what the heck I will just ask my neighbor directly whatever I might need to know, and I asked -“Whats the best way to keep the house clear of coakroches.” And pleasantly without the process of intimate friendship and sharing I realized I could just get away with good solutions from pointed questions without much embarrassment!

I called up another friend and got the same suggestion and the whole procedure for the massacre as well. It must be good I decided. So I brought the powder and made the dough and stuck it wherever I felt the roaches would visit. The next morning as assured, I expected to see some dead roaches lying about. I was bitterly disappointed..Not even one! But then from the second day on I saw the dead roaches here and there. And I was so thrilled to see the dead ones! The writhing ones I smashed to the finish line.

It is a slow process to becoming a murderer. First time it is difficult and then it becomes easier and easier, until your senses are numbed to the misery of the coachroach. I, the tender heart, was so merciless with the roaches. “Be careful about what you condemn, for that you are in danger of becoming!” is what came to my mind as I boasted about the number of kills each day. But then Gandhiji's words came to my rescue or rather my modified version of what he said.

Well let me warn you first; what he said may not even remotely seem to be linked to my topic. So here's what he said “Earth provides enough to satisfy every man's need, but not every man's greed." But as a corollary doesn’t it mean “In whatever evil we do we have to check whether it is for a justifiable need or a reckless greed.”? Am I twisting it too much? Well I know Benjamin Franklin seems to have said, "Man is a very reasoning creature; he creates a reason for whatever he wants to do". Yeah sure I know that; but examples might help here to justify my reasoning. Killing a common fowl for food as opposed to killing for sport, is an example of it. If I had gone about hating and killing all the coakroaches in the world it would have been an evil, than killing some roaches that encroached into a space I mark as mine. That is a need. It should have respected my space and kept away or bear with the consequences, right?

“Every war is fought for peace” Once the threat to our space is removed, and the adversary learns to respect our space, the war should cease. "Life is too short to spend in quarrels", and yet life is lived by doing what needs to be done for peace, even when it is a quarrel, a battle, a war that is a requisite to attain it.. We often have to fight a few battles to avoid a destructive war

And now for some whisper of an advice; whatever we do, even if termed wrong, may be perfectly fine as long as it brings good in the long run, but there are dangers when conscience erodes or when we lose sight of the purpose. That is why even one offence is such a dangerous thing, which is also why some religions prefer to teach to refrain from even killing a fly; as one may slowly learn the pleasures of killing (or other evils similarly). We might chose a “wrong path” where the end justifies the means; but we must always check not to become what we once despised. Our war should easily cease when it is peace.

Waking Up .......

The Awake ; It represents the opening out to the field of cosmic intelligence. The point through which this opening or attuning happens is the Sahastra Chakra. Its name means "thousand petal lotus”. This attuning can happen after a period of focused meditation of love towards the devine

The Sahastra or Crown Chakra is located at the crown or top of the head (baby's soft spot). It is the opening to the universe- to the highest consciousness or the spiritual self. It is connected with upper brain (cerebral cortex) and is also associated with the pineal gland (third eye)

This is where the interlocking happens between the mortal and the divine. The mind is no longer contained within the head, it expands. Just as the interconnections between the left and right brain leads to communication between the logical and the emotive faculties (left and right); the chakra at which the connection is made is such a similar interlocking of the mind to the higher intelligence.

The energy travels through this connection in a clockwise or anticlockwise spiralling motion and is converted by the glands for the physical development (as of brain functions) and personal growth (spiritual qualities like unconditional love). It's like opening a window in the mind, letting in the refreshing outside air. In fact better breathing is similar in effect in bringing about wholesome development and is a part of the yogic approach to spiritual growth.

The opening of this chakra, the inflow of divine energy is like the scattering of seeds on fertile land (just as Jesus explained in a parable about the Kingdom of God being like a farmer scattering seeds). The seed is not seen and the implications of the event may not be understood by the seeker, until with added years,the seeds sprout, the plants are noticed, the flowers bloom and the smell emanates to all. It's only then that the seeker realizes, to have in fact woken up to the Kingdom





"...They sprouted, grew, and produced a crop that was thirty, sixty, and even a hundred times as much as had been planted!" (Mark Ch 4)

The Marriage Habit...Why Not?

I read a line in paper that got me thinking. It said about a certain celebrity couple-‘They were together for a year, that’s quite long by LA standards’. We are all addicted to the highs of love and when that fades in a year we move to the next. And so end up in a string of relationships. Man is a pleasure seeker and society knows that decisions taken under the whims of pleasure are self destructive. What when old age happens? You are left with nobody.

'Do not ignore the wisdom of long experience….'
Our ancestors found it necessary to bind man in marriage and religious laws, to stop him from destroying his future by marriage hopping. They knew that marriage was also important to protect the naïve trusting woman from being merely used; to pressure the self seeking man to discover his loyalties or become a creature of habit; to allow the child to have a secure future.

Society is changing again. Now sex before marriage is seen as practical unlike a few decades ago where it was unthinkable. So I was surprised when, after the legal age for sex was raised to 18 (after the Protection of Children against Sexual Offences Bill was cleared on 26th April, 2012), a news paper article revealed that there were still some guys who considered sex as sacred and preferred sex after marriage! What was shocking to me though was that, the interviewers ‘gave the guys a reality check’ saying that guys can’t wait that long! To put ideas in the last of a breed! Isn’t that quite like saying life is all about sex?

Brahmacharya(Chastity) up till 25 years was not really an 'unscientific' useless idea. It helps in bringing interest in all aspects of life that may take a backseat when one becomes sexually active. It helps to focus on the learning, personality development and career building aspect of life, where sex can be more of a distraction if given into. It helps to get interested in all the other wonders of the world, art, nature, adventure; before being swept into anything which can be all consuming. In the teenage if one manages to have self control, it is an asset for life. But once a person gets into a string of relationships, it is easier to break up than to settle down with one, when the Grihastha(House holder) phase comes.

But yeah I would say there can never be a hard and fast. There can only be ideals and then there can be exceptions; but society is supposed to focus on ideals, whereas life may often lead some to be the exceptions. When in the past the doors were closed to multiple options, one had to focus and work at the relationship at hand and eventually succeed in making it work or learn the arts of adjustment and compromise. The toughest things to handle in a marriage were handled by religion. Religion, rules, laws were all for our own good. It brings order; as once chaos is chosen it is difficult to bring the pleasure seeking man back to the “order” that is better for his soul, his peace, his health and his future.

Institutions that have evolved need to be respected. Cohabitation is a trap which gives an easy escape once boredom sets in. Love dies, friendships fade but companionship held together by a legal act is the only thing that can last though many upheavals. I read of a couple breaking up because according to them being together was just habit and love had died. Of course the heady love dies and actually habit is not a bad thing. We can't always live in awe of the Sun! Everything we do like waking up, the food we eat, even the rain, everything revolves around the sun. Being habituated to seeing it does not mean we don’t need it; because we see it daily, doesnt mean there is no wonder to it. The truth is we cant even exist without the sun.

In the same way we get used to the people around us but that doesn’t mean they are not important to us, they have not meant anything to us. Eventually with togetherness (in a marriage), familial love is born, which may not have the heady gush of a new love but it signifies acceptance, adaptation and assurance. Moreover ‘family is not just about love, but its about being there, about watching out for another... -Where are you?, how are you faring? In the long run we realize someone asking these questions is more important than momentary uncommitted pleasure relationships. These are questions a lover would not ask, but a family would.’ What matters eventually is protection security affection and a looking out for the other.

I heard from some friends settled in US about how the US became a free society- War deaths, led to single parents, who had no means of marrying off their kids, leading them to allow their kids to find their own mates. It led to the culture that was not really intended, and hence not really to be emulated. A culture evolved out of crisis is a compromise, not a culture.

Lets not be afraid of the Marriage Habit then, and trust that all that our ancestors have arranged for us is for our good and so work at it, holding on to this trust.

Blessed the Child, the Womb

The Womb- It is the most mysterious of all places. Here life is conceived and the formless, attains a form. The mother carries the baby for nine months in the womb, she cannot see the baby, and is not aware how the baby is moulded so perfectly within her. She does not mould the formless mass into the child, but it is a bond that is divinely formed in the womb that connects the mother and child and provides for the moulding.

The Chord that links us to our divine self , is such an invisible bond, that feeds and nourishes our spirit into a Child of God.



Savior- “Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me..Mathew 18:5.

We have all noticed how much Jesus was moved with affection towards children. Lets be reminded of His words....

Jesus said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these."Mathew 19:14

He called a little child and had him stand among them.Mathew 18:2
Then he said, "I tell you the truth, unless you turn from your sins and become like little children, you will never get into the Kingdom of Heaven.Mathew 18:3
Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.Mathew18:4

But if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea. Mathew 18:6

We have seen both the forgiving, kind, Jesus and also the Wrathful Jesus especially when he spoke against the Pharisees. I have been often surprised at how scorching words Jesus could use when speaking to them. Why the forgiving Lord who knew man is basically sinful was so harsh and critical about the Pharisees. Then I learnt some other historical truths which revealed "the basis of Christs unflattering description of the Pharisees".

There are sins which Jesus forgave as we notice; many times over he has been kind to sinful adulterous women, even protecting from a stoning that the pharisees were instigating to test Jesus; and then there are sins that brought forth wrath in Jesus ... like against the Pharisees whom he describes as hypocrites, blind guides, and adulterous,..... as they had created loopholes to laws allowing indirect forms of murder and certain forms of adultery allowing abuse involving kids!

But if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea. Mathew 18:6
Jesus was obviously most disturbed by sins against Children, to have used words as these. Of all sins it was sin against a child or childlike innocence and trust, that brought utter wrath in Jesus' words. It has to be the most grievous of sins in the eyes of God.

It is very clear from the verses in the Bible that to understand what pleases God most, we have to understand how a child thinks, feels and loves. We have to go back into the innocence of our own childhood and remember how trusting we were of everyone. We must thank all those adults who allowed our life to be innocent and unknowing of the evils of the world. As we grow we realize that not all kids are as lucky; from a few days to few months old, there are many kids who have suffered a loss of trust and been given over to a life of fear and mistrust.

Lets pray for the innocent child, may each innocent bloom grow to its full without having to lose its trust and innocence. For God is most evident in The Child and Childlike. To give them the affection and protection that they need is 'giving directly - to God'