Your Life doesn’t need any fixing

“Oh! God! Can you bring along your toolbox? My Life needs fixing!” __ Anonymous.

Interesting thought that. But in reality our lives are all, perhaps, pre-fixed. Like a pre-paid SIM card. What you are, what you are going through, is part of a larger, inscrutable cosmic design. The best you__and I__can do is to accept the design as it is, for what it is, and live fully, peacefully, happily! The truth also about your Life is that you have always been what you are, except when you awaken spiritually, you know who you are and who have been so far! This awakening will lead you to understand and appreciate that despite whatever you may want fixed, Life will do exactly what it pleases and when it pleases.

So, let’s stop arguing with Life and battling it. Instead live it! It is still beautiful. And it is so only because of its unpredictability and its seductive mystique! The truth, therefore, your Life doesn’t need any fixing. What you bring to your Life, your attitude, most definitely does! 

Attend to your Life to see how perfect it is

Life is perfect. As it is, it is beautiful.

You don't notice how perfect your Life is, how beautiful it is, because you are not present in the moment, you are not attending to Life! Your body is here, but 'you' are lost in your own world. Think about it. A lot of your waking time is indeed spent worrying about what will happen or brooding over what has happened. From financial priorities to relationship issues to just a lot of anxiety over all the work that’s still to be done – you agonize over everyone and everything! And, therefore, your Life appears to you to be far from perfect. You imagine your Life to be imperfect because you want your Life to be different from what it is. This want holds you hostage – it prevents you from realizing this simple truth that your Life cannot be any other way. It is always what it is.

One way to participate in living and engage with Life it is to get up and walk. Every time that you find your thoughts are going astray, and dragging you into worry or anxiety, and are taking you away from the now, just get up and walk. Even if it is within your home or your office. Just walk. When you walk, you will find that your focus shifts from your current reality to your present environment. They may appear to be similar scenarios but they are two different things. Because you are so absorbed in your current reality, you don't pay attention to Life. When you pay attention, when you attend to Life, you notice its beauty and magic. You will notice the spider on the wall, you will notice the daylight streaming through the windows kicking up millions of dust particles, you will notice the dew drop on the leaf struggle to defeat the intensity of the rising sun, you will notice your child's scrawl on her desk, you will notice the fragrance of your beloved still hanging in your room long after she has gone to work… You will realize that Life is indeed beautiful – no matter what circumstances you are currently faced with.

The 19^th Century German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844~1900) has so aptly said, "All truly great thoughts are conceived by walking". When you walk, and pay attention, the greatest thought that can arise in your mind is one of gratitude. Because, very simply, you can walk! There are so many, many people out there who can’t! Isn’t that enough evidence of how perfect your Life is? When you recognize how lucky you are__to be able to walk, see, touch, feel and hear, you will soak in gratitude. When you are grateful, you will discover that, after all, despite all that you don't have and so badly want, your Life is indeed perfect the way it is.

Only YOU can make your Life beautiful!

When Life deals you deadly blows you have two options – either to feel depressed or to simply take it in your stride and move on! The second option may appear to be a difficult one. But when exercised can be truly liberating.

Let me share with you the story of my friend, who’s in his 40s. I met him earlier this week, many years after he had separated from his wife. His wife actually had dealt with him rather unusually – taking over his property, deserting him and migrating to the US with their child. While she may have had her own reasons for her actions, my friend was devastated. He just could not reconcile, for several months, with what had happened. I remember him telling me: “I loved her and still love her a lot. She could have just told me that she wanted to break away from me and I would have walked away without a question. That she chose not to trust me with her decision hurts me more than her leaving me. And why deny me access to my own child?”

Over time, my friend immersed himself in his work. And all of us around him felt he had managed his emotional state pretty well. When I met him a few days ago, I asked him how he was coping. What he told me blew me away completely and my admiration for him has swelled. Here’s how the conversation went.

Me: “So, how are you coping with Life?”

Him: “Life’s beautiful. I married a Kashmiri woman whose husband died of cancer some years ago and adopted her son as my own.”

Me: “That’s wonderful. How old is the boy? And how has he adapted to you?”

Him: “The boy is 12 now. It’s been three years. He calls me ‘daddy’ and we are great friends. My wife and I are also great friends. To tell you the truth, I have a special and beautiful friendship with her. After her husband’s death, her in-laws were not supportive. They harassed her and blamed her for their son’s death (he was diagnosed with cancer within a few months of their marriage). She even contemplated suicide as she could not handle them nor get over her loss. She loved her husband a lot and did not see a meaning in her continuing to live. We have a mutual friend who asked me if I could consider marrying her so that she could get out of the tyrannical clutches of her in-laws. When I met her for the first time, she told me openly that she did not want to ever physically consummate our marriage. Because she still feels the presence of her husband in her Life. So, she told me that our own marriage may not work out. I liked her openness. And her concern for me. I told her we could still marry and be great friends. That’s how it all started and all three of us are very, very, very happy!”

Me: “That’s such a great choice and gesture. I respect you. But don’t you miss something: maybe physical intimacy? Maybe your first wife?”

Him: “Life’s not about sex and physical relationships alone. I still love my first wife. But she’s gone. What’s the point in pining for her or holding a grudge against her? I decided to channelize my love for her and my first child, who’s with her, toward my second wife and her son. Their presence in my Life keeps me anchored and their friendship keeps me going.”

Even as I recall this conversation here, I feel blessed that I learned something from my dear friend.

1.   .  Life’s not only about physical intimacy with a spouse. There’s a special friendship that’s possible if you make the effort. And if nurtured, through sharing, caring and compassion, as in my friend’s case, it can make Life meaningful!
2.     Carrying a grudge against someone, however wrong they may have been or however badly they may have treated you, affects you more than the other person. It makes you unhappy and depressive.

My friend’s story leaves us all with a powerful message – No matter what has happened in your Life, you can still make it beautiful if you want to!

Don't intellectualize Life, just live it!

You can’t intellectualize Life. You can only live it.

And the best way to live is to see from your soul. From the real core of your being. When you open your soul, you will see the light.

You are really not what you think you are __ you are not your name or body or qualification or your job! You are the Universe’s energy that’s powering you, and is actually powering all of creation. This isn’t complex at all. Every thing that’s happening to you and has happened or will happen in the future, is transient. Which is why in Indian culture, we refer to Life as ‘maya’ or as an illusion. So, in the end, this entire lifetime will be over, this experience you have had will end, but you soul will go on.

All your problems, worries, anxieties, fear, suffering come when you intellectualize Life. I have no money, what will I do? I am starting a new job, what will happen if I don’t fit into the new place’s culture? I have cancer and I will die soon. All these are intellectual responses. You have been conditioned to believe that you need money to live. That you cannot survive cancer. That people are unkind and that you must be wary of them in general. The soul has no such issues. It is impregnable. Nothing can touch it. If you understand your true Self, and see from your soul, you will live Life. And not merely exist.

Swami Ramakrishna Paramhamsa explains this very well. He was asked: “What is the logical, rational support for your illumination?” The question really was to understand what as the evidence for Ramakrishna’s enlightenment. He replied: “I am the argument. If you can understand me, if you can feel me you will know my illumination. It is radiating but your eyes are closed. Now I am not responsible for your eyes. If you want to know me, open your eyes -- and not only the outward eyes but the inward too, because my illumination is of the inner.”

So it is with each of us. Our souls are closed. We operate as if our excel sheets and smart phones and our decisions make our lives happen. The truth is that Life makes our lifetimes happen. We don’t! If we accept this reality, Life will be simpler and much, much, much more beautiful!

When you pause for a while and watch lazy raindrops fall rhythmically on water puddles, when you see a baby sleeping peacefully with no care about the world around it, when you hear the bleating of a goat, when you see the sun magically disappear over the horizon, when you reflect on your breathing…..in those times, your soul will be open. The key is to make this experience consistently repeatable. And that can happen ONLY when intellectualization stops and living begins!

                                                                                                                                                                                          

Why ask Why?

‘WHY’ is the most debilitating question in Life! The moment you ask that, your peace will be destroyed. And you will just go crazy.

For instance, just take the recent events in our world. Why should Malala Yousafzai be shot in her head when all she asked for was her right to an education? Why should an innocent lady girl be gang-raped in New Delhi, and with such beastly brutality that she fights for her Life despite her indomitable will to live? Why should 20 angels perish in a mindless bloodbath in Connecticut? Why should miscreants infiltrate the student crowds protesting peacefully in New Delhi and why should a police constable, who was only doing his duty, have to pay the price with his Life for their unjust, violent behavior?

Why do good people have to go through pain and suffering? Why does Life always work in a cycle: extraordinary pain always being a prelude to extraordinary grace and vice versa?

WHY? This one simple question really can drive you nuts.

Reading an interview The Hindu carried yesterday with music composer, the Maestro, Ilayaraja, I learned something more about the WHY question! Subha J Rao writes of the Master’s humility and wisdom saying, “….the Master musician refuses to take credit for any of his creations. “It just came. I don’t know from where. Questioning the origin of music is like asking why the breeze is soothing, why you shiver in exhilaration when the spray from the waterfall hits you. The day you wonder where it comes from, things get difficult. Sometimes, entire songs are ready in just about five minutes.

How do you explain that?””

Ilayaraja’s perspective to Life is enlightening. He has seen it all. And learned too. A simple village lad from Pannaipuram in rural Tamil Nadu, he made it so big in the south Indian film industry that films would run in the 70s and 80s only because they had his compositions in them. And then, with the advent of the techno-age in composing music, and with the rise of the prodigal talent A.R.Rahman, Illayaraja lost his relevance. He was literally in the wilderness between 1995 and 2011. Yet, he’s back now, because of the sheer quality of his work. He epitomizes the famous saying in cricket, “Form is temporary. Class is permanent.”

So, the key to intelligent living is to never ask why __ don’t ask when you are getting the Life you want and don’t ask when you are getting the Life you don’t want. Simply live __ wanting the Life you are getting!

The WHY question is also a human question. Look around you. Do you see any other form of creation questioning anything? Everything, everyone, is in a state of acceptance. Except us humans. Which is why suffering is such a unique human condition. Pain is everywhere. When a tree is cut, there is pain that the tree goes through. When there’s a drought, the earth goes through immense pain. But there’s no evidence to suggest that they suffer. Suffering comes ONLY when you ask why you are having to go through pain? Think about it. When you get a migraine or a cancer and you don’t ask why, will you suffer? You will be in enormous physical pain, alright, but you will not suffer. Suffering is born when you ask WHY and you get no reply. Because Life doesn’t give answers. It gives us experiences and allows us to learn from them.

Simplify Life. Learn to appreciate its beauty in its inscrutability. What are you going to achieve by dissecting Life and analyzing why things are happening the way they are? It would be an intelligent proposition if you could at least get half-way through to finding the answers you seek. But making sense of Life is like taking a sharp sword and hoping to cut through water. It is an exercise in futility and make you insane. Because no sword can even as much as cause a scratch on water! Lou Majaw, the pioneering musician from Shillong, who worships Life, besides Bob Dylan, teaches us to appreciate Life the best: “Life is beautiful, and the best part is you get it for free.”

So, why look a gift horse in the mouth? Why ask WHY?