All of us would recall the structures we used to create from the sand while playing in the garden or on the beach. We will take great pride in the structure we created, the cave, the statue, and the little home. We would put in hours and hours to create those structures and, in fact, had a strong sense of ownership and possession of having created them. The "pride of creation" will be doomed when we visit the garden or beach the next day, only to find that the structure we created with so much effort has been taken away by the waves or has been crushed by some animal. The structure becomes sand again, and we try to build something new out of it.
The pot makers also do the same thing. They make the pots from mud and then fire them to make them more durable. We buy these pots and use them. But once broken, they turn into mud. So many different metals are extracted from the Earth, and we make so many different things from those metals. This laptop is also made of so many metals. Some components are made of plastic, some of iron, some of silicon, and so on. Once this laptop is out of order, its parts will again reintegrate into the crust of the Earth. What about the human beings? For the first nine months of our lives, we grow inside the womb of our mother. The genetic code of mother and father gets mixed, which works as a mould to design the new baby. All the materials required to build the body of the baby come from the same Earth. The plants make food by taking water and minerals from the soil and, in the presence of sunlight, converting carbon dioxide into food. The same food gets transmitted to the body of the mother directly or indirectly, and the same minerals and atoms of different elements make up our body.
We understand all this very well. I don't think that anybody would question this process. But the most amazing thing is that we understand the whole process, and yet we are all so sure we are different. "I" am different from the "rest". It is my family, my country, my community, and my society. But what is this "I"? Nobody has an answer. Even the neurology and quantum physics of the day have no answer. Philosophically, everybody accepts that we are made up of the same atoms and therefore we are all one. Yet, we fight over petty things. People fight for bread in poor communities, and people fight for fame and credit in powerful communities and organisations. That's strange.
Can any of us keep his hand on his heart and say that he does not have any worry? I don't think there would be anyone like that. All of us plan things out. We want to achieve certain outcomes. We feel that what we have is not good enough, and that achieving something or reaching a target will make us happier. Somebody feels that by clearing an examination, he would be better off. Somebody feels that by travelling to a few countries, he would achieve the purpose of life. Somebody feels that by marrying a girlfriend, he will be happier. Every human brain has made some meaning of happiness. So, what's wrong with that?
There is no right or wrong. However, everything has a consequence. I feel that even a person with ordinary intelligence will understand that it is not useful to set targets based on false assumptions. If we set a target to go to Ladakh in winter, looking at pictures of Ladakh in summer, we are not going to get the same experience. So it just requires very basic intelligence to understand that when we set targets for life, our fundamental assumptions have to be correct. We see so many people around us who set targets for the same things we want to achieve, with a strong belief that they will be happier, yet they are not. That means there is something wrong with the fundamental assumptions. Had marriage or travelling abroad, or selection in a particular competitive exam made us happy, so many people would have been happy on this Earth. Once Buddha asked a lady, who was very sad about the demise of her son, to bring some food from a home where everybody is happy and contented, but she could not find even a single family in the whole town. I am sure that we will not be able to find even a single person like that in our lifetime, and if we find one, his awareness of life will change us forever.
We just need to revisit the fundamental assumptions underlying the hypothesis we have built in our minds that "happiness lies in X, Y, or Z". A very basic interaction with the people around us would quickly reveal the fallacy in these assumptions. If we just look back and examine our lives in silence, we would quickly understand that the happiest moments were the ones when we did not think about the outcome and remained fully present. The discussions with friends wherein there was no intention to prove or achieve something, the relationship with a friend without any expectations, the reading of the book with no fixed idea or question, watching a movie, where we do not want the climax our way, visiting a place with a backpack with no fixed points to cover, entering into a venture with no fixed target, writing a blog with no fixed idea in the mind. When happiness is so easy and readily available, isn't it foolish to pay such a heavy price for the same? Probably, all the elements within us, the human body, have been assembled so that "we" can experience the infinite possibilities that exist to be explored, rather than to achieve some outcome based on a very limited awareness of this brain. When so many people are dancing on the floor, we can't get fixated on the dance item we have practised. The dance floor will have its own rhythm, whether we like it or not. If someone is really in love with dance, it does not matter which song the DJ plays. If somebody is in love with life, the circumstances do not matter.
Comments